Twinn Swan

Rats love cheese. Mice love cheese, too. It’s one of those stereotypes, isn’t it? Food is a fundamental need of all physical beings. We need it for survival. And yet, if we look at the food and beverage industry, it is not courting our survival needs, but trying to arouse our desires. It goes well and beyond what we actually need to survive.

I remembered how when I was a child, we would trap rats by luring them into a cage or a clunk of glue with a piece of cheese. Some mornings or evenings, we would return to these traps and see the mouse there–caged, trapped and unable to go anywhere for we had used its survival instinct against itself.

The rat’s survival instinct, instead of helping it to survive, had instead lured it into the arms of the biggest predator in the world–the human.

But are rats that different to us? Scientists will probably say no due to the genetic similarities. Rats, much like pigeons, are two animals that flourish, instead of flounder, in urban environments. They must be a great deal like us to be able to live with us and propagate, much like we do.

Sometimes, in our life, chasing after our survival needs ends up being something that traps us. We end up getting and feeling ‘stuck’ in glue or locked in the cage; and the man who lured us there won’t let us out.

At the same time, if I were looking at it from another angle, I would say that a mouse really knows how to appreciate and accept the little things in life; even if it is just a piece of cheese.

The mouse is a humble and modest creature. It isn’t seeking luxurious conditions in which to flourish as a species. It is able and willing to use anything it can to survive. Our survival needs are not as complex as societal norms have conditioned them to be. We don’t need much to survive.

At the same time, I did come to realise that this trick–clunk of glue and cage–did not work indefinitely. Rats are fast learners. After a while, they stopped falling for these traps. They had adapted to the prevailing difficulty and had learned to survive despite the fact that there were people out to get them and that the odds were stacked against them.

We may never trust the rat, but at the same time, it is a resourceful animal and I just can’t help but admire its lack of pretence.