I can think of a number of things a greedy individual might consider trying to smuggle from one country to another for profit: jewels, works of art, or a secret recipe for the world’s best tiramisu, for example.

But these? Hundreds of them? And strapped to my body?

Not in this lifetime . . . or any other!

But someone recently did try: a 28-year-old South Korean national who was boarding a flight from Lima, Peru, to France, planning to continue from there to South Korea, where there seems to be a market for scary bugs. But he aroused the suspicion of airport security officials at Lima’s Jorge Chavez International Airport when it was noticed that his stomach area looked “bulky.”

And when they searched him, what they found were “hundreds of insects [actually, mostly arachnids] packaged inside ziplock bags strapped to his abdomen.” [Jack Guy, CNN, November 20, 2024.]

When the stash was inspected and counted, it was found to contain 320 tarantulas (the arachnids), 110 centipedes (arthropods), and nine bullet ants (actual insects). [Id.]

More about those little insect devils later. But I ask myself how this living theater of the absurd (and the terrifying) was expected to survive, sealed as they were in ziplock bags. Wouldn’t they suffocate? Or if there were air holes, might some of them not try to make a run for it? (You think “Snakes on a Plane” was scary?)

Fortunately, they never got a chance to try. The critters are now said to be in the care of the appropriate Peruvian authorities. And so, apparently, is the would-be smuggler.

Now, I’ve heard of wildlife smuggling . . . I imagine we all have. But that’s usually about beautiful, exotic animals destined for an illicit zoo, or for some wealthy, amoral person’s private amusement. But these things? They’re just the stuff of my nightmares.

It turns out that tarantulas are a threatened species, so maybe someone in South Korea is trying to increase the herd (or whatever you call a group of tarantulas). Frankly, I’d be happy to know that the damned things had become extinct . . . but that’s just my visceral reaction. I suppose they do serve some purpose in the circle of life, so I’ll simply assume Mother Nature knows what she’s doing.

I don’t know about the centipedes. They’re not listed as endangered, other than one species native to the island of Mauritius, which is nowhere near Peru or South Korea.

And as for those bullet ants — well, they’re almost as frightening as the tarantulas. It is a large ant, not aggressive unless threatened, at which time it will deliver a sting said to feel like a gunshot — hence its name — that is considered to be the most painful of all insect stings. It is native to the rain forests of Central and South America, including Peru. Why anyone in South Korea would want to spend good money to import them is beyond me. But then, I’m not what you would call a “bug person.”

*. *. *

Now, if you think this was weird, the CNN article closed with mention of a couple of other recorded cases of “buggling” — my newly made-up name for bug-smuggling.

In December of 2021, Colombian authorities seized a suitcase at Bogota’s El Dorado Airport containing “at least” 232 tarantulas, 67 cockroaches, nine spider eggs, and a scorpion with seven of its young. [Id.] And my immediate reaction was: “What . . . no calling birds or French hens?” Then I came to my senses and thought: “Cockroaches??!!! What in hell would anyone want with more cockroaches? They’re impossible to exterminate, for heaven’s sake!”

I still don’t have an answer to that one, and I’m not sure I’d want to hear it.

But I do understand the shipment of nearly 3,500 shark fins bound from Colombia to Hong Kong in September of the same year. I’ve never tried it, but I understand shark fin soup is quite a delicacy. Still, it is the subject of controversy in China . . . and illegal to smuggle in any event.

But where there is a market for almost anything, there will always be some unscrupulous person willing to supply it.

At least, if the profit is big enough.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
11/25/24