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"Holy cow! Look at that snake in the road! It's freakin' huge!" I exclaimed the other day while driving along the road toward the village, and braked to a stop so as not to hit it, checking in the rear view mirror first. I’d rather kill the snake than myself and my wife and sis, or someone else driving behind me I hadn't noticed. There, crossing the soi (street), was a very large snake, a cobra, a golden-yellowish one, at least six feet long and as big around as my wrist; and my wrists aren't small.
"Snake bite you you dead five minutes." states Sis, ever the bearer of good news. "Not make for hospital." (Meaning, you'll be dead before you ever get to a hospital.)
Some say the snakes are more afraid of us than we are of them, but this one didn't look very scared to me. It was beautiful, it was stately, and almost majestic in its sinuous slither across the tarmac. King of its realm, it was deadly as all hell, and a shiver ran down my spine as I watched it cross before us. Not another vehicle was on the road. This was the fifth large cobra I'd seen in my travels about the countryside of Isaan, snake-infested Thailand, in only a week. Something's going on. Maybe it’s mating season or something, but they are on the move right now. More so than I've usually seen.
My wife and Sis swear seeing a snake cross the road in front of you is big good luck. Myself, I consider it good luck I'm in the truck with the doors closed, and my legs and limbs nowhere near these highly poisonous bastards. It makes me maybe want to rethink my trudging about the fields and dikes of the rice fields to get to a fishing hole in my shorts and sneakers; at least for a while as they do seem to be so active now.
I've seen poisonous snakes in the wild in the states, rattlers as big as this cobra in the desert of New Mexico and Arizona, and water moccasins in the waters of Florida that would scare the crap out of you as you were fishing for smallmouth bass and the damned snake would chase after a fish you had hooked and were reeling in to the boat. But there seems to be something about the name 'Cobra' that brings an instant respect for the creature that bears this name. Seeing one in the wild is a thrill, from a distance for sure, and it's rare they do harm most times. I wouldn't want to step on one, or even be near one, myself though. I'm not like that crazy Aussie guy on TV who chases wild things around, and tries to get up as close as he can and catch them. As far as I'm concerned he's a looney bastard, a professional looney bastard maybe, but still a looney bastard all the same. Good luck to him, and I hope he makes a bundle of dough entertaining us with his antics. This is NOT something you'd catch ol' Cent doing though.
I asked Sis, "You ever know anyone who got bit by a cobra?" as we started back down the soi after the snake disappeared into the weeds along the side of the road.
"Sure." she said in all seriousness.
"When was the last time you heard of this, of someone you knew?" I pestered her.
Sis thought a minute and said, "Maybe four five year ago. Friend me. Snake bite he, he dead quick."
I grimaced, "Killed him?"
Sis laughed, "Yes, snake kill he dead."
I thought a moment and asked, "What was he doing when he got bit by the cobra?"
Sis says, "He look frog for eat."
Shit, killed for a frog to eat. I'll stick to the roadside food stalls, restaurants and the Macro Superstore for food for my meals I think. I don't care much for the taste of frog anyway. You'll see a lot of village guys out at night in the rice fields and water holes along the highways with these long poles with a small three-pronged trident on the end, wearing what looks to be miner lamps strapped to their heads. These are the frog hunters. They'll also kill rats and anything else they may feel is edible enough to throw into the cooking pot as well. Like I've said before if you've been reading these stories of mine ... Thais will eat damned near anything from what I've seen.
Some of our farm frogs. Fine eating for small money folks.
My wife bought a shitload of baby frogs for a hundred baht a few months ago. I'm talking a couple/few hundred tiny frogs for around 2.50 US dollars. I came back last week from the states after seven weeks away and went to see these future meals in the pen in the village where she keeps them, at her cousin's house. They are humongous now! The size of a good-sized bullfrog like we have in the states, and there are now shitloads of them ready almost for the eating. We have three 'frog pens'; one for the small ones, one for the medium ones as they grow up, and one for the large eating sized frogs. These frogs though aren't smooth skinned like our leopard frogs and green frogs. Kermit the Frog they ain’t. These froggies are ugly as sin, look like a hop toad more than a frog to me. Brown and lumpy and nasty looking they are. Just looking at them crawling all over each other when I picked up the piece of old roofing they all hide under from the sun made me swear not to eat any offered to this ol' Yankee boy once they are harvested. I'll go to KFC when they eat these ugly bastards, and I'd bet a dollar to a dime these frogs being here are attracting the damned cobras to come near the house. It's what they eat, a favored meal for them.
My bitch of a soi-dog, Star, had puppies a few days ago. Eight of them. She had them under a low young banana tree in a thicket of bushes and weeds and overhanging banana leaves. Stupid bitch. Now she won't let us move them somewhere safer. This tree/bush is right next to the damned frog pen. Needless to say there are now only six puppies left. No one can find hide nor hair of them anywhere around. My wife wants to know where the hell they went. I told her as we searched around.
"Inside snake I'd bet, darling."
"No! Why you say?" she gasps.
"Because of all the damned cobras we've been seeing lately, and the fact she has the puppies here right next to the frog pen, which cobras like to eat, and because Star isn't exactly standing guard all night over them. She's a first time Mama, and hasn't a clue really yet. Plus having that cobra in the kitchen a while back tells me they must be prowling about around here at night. The puppies are prime eating for a big snake."
"You think so?" she says, not convinced.
"Sure. The cobras are probably Khmer snakes. They like to eat dogs right?" I grinned to her.
She laughed, and said maybe I was right, but she thinks someone in the village is stealing the puppies and says she is going to place the dogs there at night on a chain to guard the area. We walked away from the pups and went into the house. Hopefully there weren't any snakes in the damned kitchen again. I'm going to have to start carrying around one of those long handled frog-hunting tridents like the village Thai guys all have with me around the fields and woods.
Anyone want a puppy? They're going fast!
Cent
(The Central Scrutinizer)
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