Le Xuan Viet, a rats hunter, invites peo

XUAN CAU, VIET NAM: Le Xuan Viet, a rats hunter, invites people to buy rats he has caught on rice fields 04 June 1999 in a corner of his village's market in Xuan Cau village, northern province of Hung Yen. In this village where people eat rats, there are a dozen of rats hunters like him and each day they sell their catch for about one dollar per kilogram. Rats are seen as the first enemy for agricultural production in Vietnam. They destroy between 5 and 10 percent of its production each year. Eating small animals and insects in Asia is not considered all that extraordinary. There are a number of these foods which in some cases have become delicacies which date back many years and have now almost become traditional eating being prepared and cooked in many different ways using herbs, spices, ginger and garlic to enhance flavours. Some restaurants even have dishes of some animals as their main drawcard and is considered a normal cuisine. The Japanese love their whale meat and pufferfish, Cambodians are known to eat tarantulas-hairy spiders, while a number of other cultures incourage the eating of rats, snakes, bugs, beetles, monkeys (brains), crocodile, bats, scorpions, honey ants, grubs, embroyo eggs and many more. AFP PHOTO/HOANG DINH NAM/na (Photo credit should read HOANG DINH NAM/AFP via Getty Images)