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When infestations affect Notting Hill billionaires, it reminds you that it’s the little winged bastards who truly own this city

While reading of the case of the super-rich couple suing the previous owners of their west London mansion over its moth infestation, one particularly detail prompted warm memories. Iya Patarkatsishvili and Yevhen Hunyak had to tip away glasses of wine after discovering moths floating in them, Hunyak told the court. Ah yes, I thought, I too have found a moth taking a little dip in my tipple, though I’ll admit that I simply fished him out rather than waste a glass. Worse, mine only contained Tesco’s finest wine, as opposed to, you know, the world’s.

Moths, it seems, pay no attention to social class. Whether you are a lowly renter in a poky flat, such as I, or the daughter of a Georgian billionaire; if you live in London, they are coming for you. Moths, like mice in the tube, are simply a fact of living in this city, so commonplace as to be almost unremarkable. Even when waging daily battle against them, you sort of forget about them; their soft fluttering wings are a kind of inaudible mood music, until someone who has recently moved here says, “What’s with all the moths?”, and you remember the bastards that truly own this city.

Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist and author

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