Despite my fear of piranhas (a very healthy fear, if you ask me), I was determined to give piranha fishing a try myself. I mean, how many times in my life would I get to fish in the Amazon? The more appropriate question would have been “how many times had I fished – ever, anywhere?” There had been a couple of occasions in my pre-teens but I now suspect that my Dad did everything for me all the while making me believe that I had some skill.

Anyway, by the time I got going with my rod/ stick thing, Hemingway (a.ka. The Husband) had already caught about six piranhas in succession and was looking mighty chuffed with himself. Now, I know that I need to grow up and simply accept that he will forevermore be better than me at basically everything related to sport and/or the outdoors.

But I can’t.

And so, given that Hemingway has never expressed any interest in fishing whatsoever in the ten years I’ve known him, I decided to take him on. After many failed attempts on my part, Ricardo, (the junior guide) decided to intervene in an attempt to be helpful and took hold of the fishing rod.

With me.

Fishing “a deux”.

At the age of 30.

How cute.

I felt like saying: “I know, that you know, that I know, that you are the one actually doing the fishing here, so for goodness sake, LET GO!!!!!!”

But the poor, sweet Spaniards had caught their one piranha each, taken their photo with the monstrous fish and were now plastered to their seats, drenched in sweat and yawning up a storm. So I played pretend fishing with Ricardo.

E V E E E E E E e e e e e e e N T U A L L Y, I (Ricardo) had something.

I (Ricardo) pulled it up out of the water.

It didn’t look like the same species of piranha the others had caught. It wasn’t bloated like a blaashoppie, with reddish bits on the edges. Instead, it was slender and silver.

I was thinking, “maybe, I (Ricardo) have caught a really RARE type of piranha. That would be cool.”

No such luck, as it turns out. I don’t think Ricardo had the heart to break the news to me because he just kept quiet and looked at Victor.

“It’s a sardine,” Victor announced.

Awesome.

So that’s the story of how, in a two square metre stretch of water, infested with piranhas so starved they had begun to feed on their own family members, I – The Fabulous Fisherwoman from Keurboomstrand – caught the one surviving sardine.