Today, for the first time in my life, I got to see a live rhinoceros beetle. In Japan the children here have many opportunities to see, or even buy rhinoceros beetles, but I never had the chance growing up in New York, since the species is native to countries outside the US. As a child I would see pictures in books of rhinoceros beetles and imagine the day I would come across one in my yard or in a nearby park, not realizing that that was an impossibility.