What a way to start off the day; A Parktown Prawn in my shoe. You know one of those moments when you realise that something is in your shoe with your foot. Denial kicks in and you are 100% certain of convincing yourself that its just the inner sole of the show.
It wasn’t. I took it off, shook it off and shook out a Parktown Prawn. I have blogged about them before. I hate them.
My toe is sore, I’m sure it bit me. I doubt they can bite, but my toe is sore. Maybe it’s all in my head, not in my toe?
Julian Nkolo 3:17 pm on February 1, 2008 Permalink
I’ve been in Jo’burg for 5 yrs now and had only heard rumours about the Parktown prawn and I even thought that it was something that was made up by parents to scare kids who don’t want to chow their green veges, until 2 weeks ago. I opened the curtain in the morning to check the weather and I saw something moving in the patio which at first I thought was a bird or a mice and when I looked again I saw this giant cricket walking around and other smaller insects getting out of it’s way. I must say that nobody had to tell me what that was, my goodness I have never seen such a huge insect and I use to think that the big flying roach that stays in storm drains is huge but now I stand corrected. Well all I can say is that I have’nt been out in the patio since then and if I could find it in my shoes I would move back to the Cape.
I hope your toe will get better soon better now.
Julia
robert 8:12 pm on February 2, 2008 Permalink
Parktown Prawns on toast with mayo and spinach salad. Yummy!
Yeah right.
I still shudder at the memory of the damn things. Ugh
Bronwin 10:28 am on September 2, 2008 Permalink
OMG i have never really seen a one…. are they reall that big?????? i heard that if you pour boiling water on them they scream……??????
Mike 10:37 am on October 6, 2008 Permalink
We found out about parktown prawns the hard way. One morning, my father woke up one morning and opened his eyes to see the underneath of a large adult prawn sitting on his face. Well, let me just say that his head hit the light fitting.
Since then, I have had a few incidents. I put on shoes, tied the laces and only then did I feel something walking around on my foot. I’m so glad I wear socks with shoes.
A few days ago, I put on a pair of jeans and sat down to put my shoes on and felt a prick in the side of my leg, like a black jack or something. So I rubbed it a bit and the spikey feeling moved all the way down my leg as I prodded at it until a small parktown prawn popped out the bottom.
In the last two weeks, I have had at least one parktown prawn in my house every 2 days. I must have a nest in the garden and my stupid cats seem to enjoy bringing them in to play.
I think the best way to get rid of them is with a tennis racket, a container that can close and a brick. (This is a two man approach):
Step1:
Approach slowly with the tennis racket while your partner stands by with the container and lid.
Step 2:
Prod the prawn to make it jump.
Step 3:
When it jumps, take a full swing with the racket, if you hit it against the wall hard enough, you may knock it out temporarily.
Step 4:
Quickly, get the prawn in the container before it recovers, move fast, it does not take long.
Step 5:
Find a solid piece of ground outside, this is the messy part.
Step 6:
Shake the container rapidly to knock the prawn out and chuck it on the ground.
Step 7:
Flatten the prawn with the brick.
Step 8:
Clean up the mess before the other prawns find out.
Step 9:
Run inside and lock all the doors and windows.
Step 10:
Seek councelling..
Nic Haralambous » Blog Archive » The best way to kill a Parktown Prawn 10:51 am on October 6, 2008 Permalink
[...] Hi and welcome to my blog! If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting and do come back.Ages ago I blogged about my experiences with Parktown Prawns. [...]
Leoni 3:12 pm on February 18, 2009 Permalink
I had a very bad experience with a Parktown Prawn. I did not that this was a Parktown Prawn untill this morning, when somebody at my work told me what it was. I was busy with my make-up and felt this scratch on my back. At first I thought it was the label of my top only to dicover I dont have a label on my top anymore. So I carried on with my make-up and I felt it again. I then alost hit my head off my body to get this thing of my back and then it tangled with my hair. I evently got the thing of me and saw this ugly thing. I hit it a few times with a shoe before it died. The rest off the day I keep feeling this Parktown Prawn on me. This was really not a Lekker feelling.