Not too long after I moved my family from Mississippi to the tropical island of Okinawa, I came to the realization that nearly every animal here is trying to kill us.
We had a very similar feeling when we first moved to coastal Mississippi because of the alligators, snakes, spiders, and jellyfish.
This island is littered with giant snails that cause encephalitis (swelling of the brain) if mishandled, giant spiders, rockfish (the most venomous fish in the world), and my least favorite the deadly habu snake. I haven’t even scratched the surface of the menagerie of menaces on this island, but the habu stands out as my least favorite. Snakes give me the willies. Even these cute little mouse-looking creatures called shrews have hollow teeth and can inject venom when they bite.
To counteract the presence of the habu, the Okinawan government released a large number of mongooses throughout the island in 1910. The thought that a highly venomous and nearly invisible predator could be lurking in every branch or behind every rock has been on my mind in all our excursions.
After moving here, one of my first family excursions was to the mountainous jungle area known as the Motobu Peninsula.
We took the 45-minute drive from our house to a mandarin orchard, where we were given an opportunity to pick mandarins straight from the trees. Unfortunately, when we got to the orchard, we learned that we were three weeks too early to pick the fruit.
With slight disappointment, we took a moment to see what else was available in the area. We didn’t want to go home without creating a memorable adventure. We were striking out on ideas.
As we started back down the mountain to go home, my 10-year-old saw a hand-painted sign of a mongoose with boxing gloves punching a snake. He giggled and pointed it out. The words were in Japanese, but the sign was an indicator that we could see a mongoose fight a habu.
Of course, ethically dubious, I didn’t want to see an animal harmed for sport, but hey…even the Bible condemns snakes. Far be it for me to refute ancient biblical wisdom.
We made our way to the arena. A 90-year-old Okinawan man named Miyagi-san dressed in a denim jacket and a rolled handkerchief tied around his forehead greeted us and told us that the next show would be in 30 minutes. We were ushered to the back of the arena gift shop and handed an ice cream cone while we waited.
When the show was ready for us, an announcement directed us to the benches in front of a stage with a waist-high plexiglass wall separating us from the various breeds of habu that can be found on the island.
I looked around and saw that my family was the only family there for the show. I got nervous for two reasons: (1) I felt like all the attention was on us and we would be forced to touch these demonic fanged ropes, and (2) This could be a trap in this jungle mountain, and nobody would ever hear from the Lamar family again.
Luckily, Miyagi-san didn’t force the issue and make us touch the snakes if we didn’t want to, nor did we get kidnapped and used to feed the snakes. Miyagi-san spent the next hour pulling various dangerous animals from their cages and handling them like they were harmless kittens.
Miyagi-san explained that they are no longer allowed to do the habu vs. mongoose fights, but they had videos of previous fights, which we watched in the darkened theater with a half dozen baskets of deadly snakes…I couldn’t wait for the film to finish and the lights to come back on.
My younger son had one of the longer habu snakes draped around his shoulders while Miyagi-san held the head. Ironically, we weren’t even allowed to pet the mongoose because they are so fast and hard to control. It was a sure thing they would try to bite us due to their aggression.
Once we left the show, everyone was hungry. We drove through a mountaintop ridge road and found a Japanese Soba restaurant overlooking the mountain range. The view was spectacular, and the food was not only delicious, but it was a soul-restoring bowl of goodness that made everyone happy to be on this life adventure.
CONTINUE READING: A Mississippian in Japan – Atomic oyster bombs
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