Sunday, April 20, 2008

A PRAWNY ISSUE

It was ages ago when I watched my grandfather with wide eyed fascination as he fed the fish in my uncle's aquarium. A tiny live prawn had escaped from the bag he was holding and lay squirming on the floor by the aquarium, twitching in what I assumed to be in pain as it could not breathe.

That was also the day that I found out why he never liked eating prawns (well, come to think of it, not really, either because he referred to the squirming prawn as he said "that's why I don't eat them", and I don't seem to be able to connect the dots... perhaps there were not enough dots to begin with)

Anyway, I've always thought that prawns were delicious regardless of cooking method (although I did have a slight aversion towards the curried version) Nevertheless as I grew older (in my twenties) I started noticing that I almost always had to run to the bathroom to throw up within half an hour of eating prawns. And then one day about two years ago, I ended up looking like the nutty professor until I received an injection from the doctor who says that I've had an allergic reaction to something I ate. What did I eat that day? Prawns (I don't know why it's always in the lunch menu during stock take)

Recently, though.. I've noticed that the 'run to the bathroom to throw up' incident occurs every time I have prawns, even if it's only 1 piece. I guess that's it. I'm most probably mildly allergic to it right now although I do have doubts if there is such a thing as being mildly allergic. Who knows what might happen next? One type of food will have to be forever eliminated from my menu. I wonder if my grandfather's reluctance to eat prawns was caused by the same thing...

4 comments:

  1. apparently there's a couple of types of allergy, one of which is where the antibodies, or whatever it is in your body that gives you the allergic reaction, may forget themselves if you leave that food out of your diet for three months. This was explained to me by a doctor and made sense at the time, but I'm not sure my reinterpretation does. Anyway the gist of it is: if you have a mild allergic reaction to a food and you leave it out of your diet for three month, you may be able to reintroduce small amounts without getting a reaction, for awhile anyway.

    I think I liked prawns until I realised how they looked. too many legs and scary eyes. I still can't eat them without thinking of it so I never have them.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I've been fortunate enough in my life to never find any foods I'm allergic to. That's good, because I love trying new things.

    And I love prawns. :)

    Ian

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love prawns!!! Haha.. though when I was younger, me and my family went for steamboat and the prawns that they served were still alive. And young as I was, I happily put them into the boiling hot soup, and that night itself I hate nightmares with me being in the ocean with the prawns being giants creatures in the sea.

    Scary!

    ReplyDelete
  4. aunty: ok... your explanation does make sense. I've decided to write prawns off my diet for good initially, but I just might try again in 3 months... :)

    ian: I used to be in that category once... but I still like trying new stuff

    princess: lol! they're not very friendly looking, are they?

    ReplyDelete

IT's THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN

Time for the Annual Appraisal again.  It's a cloudy Sunday afternoon, and I had just finished giving scores to my subordinates on their ...