The Invasion of the Red Fire Ants sounds like the title of a hilarious B-grade horror movie - but the reality is nothing to laugh about. The potential killers are, it seems, the latest scourge to be visited on Hong Kong since the handover.
The change of sovereignty itself, you will remember, was accompanied by flashes of lightning and peals of thunder that lasted 40 days and 40 nights. Well, maybe 40 hours - but it was awesome.
The first plague was the Asian financial crisis which, significantly, struck on July 2, 1997 - the day after the handover - with the devaluation of the Thai baht. In its wake came negative equity and seven years of deflation, surely the modern-day equivalent of seven years of famine. (Here optimists will conclude that we are now poised to enjoy seven years of plenty. But remember, the Bible tells us that famine follows feast, not the other way around. And Lord knows we feasted, for seven times seven years, before the departure of the wicked 'Sinner of a Thousand Years', Chris Patten).
Other plagues we have experienced are bird flu, Sars and dengue fever, none of which was known to Hong Kong previously.
The South Asian tsunami took a relatively light toll on Hong Kong but still, it almost seems like the city has been cursed since its return to Chinese sovereignty and the departure of the British.
According to the Bible, God punished the ancient Egyptians for enslaving the Israelites and visited 10 plagues on them, the last of which was the death of all the first-born of man and beast, including the son of the Pharaoh. After that, the Pharaoh could take no more and let the Jews leave for their Promised Land.
If the same number is to be visited on Hong Kong, we have to brace ourselves for further attacks. What can we expect? Swarms of locusts, hordes of frogs, or a scourge of boils? Or perhaps their 21st century equivalent - the latest computer virus for which neither Norton nor McAfee can provide a cure?