Lyn (my boo) and I wanted to do something different to break out of our usual weekend routine which includes bathing the dogs, strolling at Ikea and loads of laundry (I know, we are really living it out). So during the National Day Saturday early this month, we headed to a prawning area beside the Bishan driving range, a good two-minute drive from my home (look, we were lazy okay?).
For $30, we rented a prawning rod (not too sure if there is such a term) for about three hours and looked around the two available man made ponds for a nice location to mount ourselves. Eagerly, we sat beside a couple of uncles who looked like they have been prawning since the days of yore, perhaps long before the famed hula hoop or when man came up with the idea of sliced bread (the next best thing after the wheel 
), whichever is earlier. Okay okay, I’m just kidding, those uncles are cool (slaps own wrist).
For the next 10 minutes or so, the patient staff/owner quickly gave us a few pointers on bait hooking and hooking prawns. Picking up a sample in under 5 minutes, he showed us how to unhook the prawn before throwing it in our collection net. Yeap, we got a free prawn even before we began. If only cookies like these are so easily handed out at work..but nope, all thanks to the world of reality we so unfortunately live in. Whining aside, Lyn headed over to the food centre nearby and got us dinner and beer…one of our many favourite combinations.
Left and right: Me and Lyn attempting at prawning
Prawning was not as easy as we thought. As we struggled away, the two uncles, I guess took pity on us and showed us how the pros do it. All we need is a little patience and once the prawn is deep into enjoying what it thought was dinner, we surprise it with a nice tug…and this is the part where the prawn becomes dinner. Before we knew it, we started picking up a couple of nice big prawns with single or double claws, and got into that nice cam whoring mode which so easily came to us.
Left and right: Pros we are not…
While searching for that perfect prawn, the two nice uncles bade us farewell before telling us that the two nets full of their catches had our names on it. Yeap, more free prawns (not to worry, I am not about to start on another “woe is me story” and my lack of freebies in real life). I can’t tell you how overwhelmed we were. The interesting part about prawning apart from figuring how the heck we can unhook a struggling prawn with claws so big it could cut your fingers off, is the quick ticking clock. The three hours we initially thought was just took long just breezed past by us at the bat of an eyelid.
With that, we quickly collected the prawns and separated our catch from the uncles. The score: Youngsters 5 – Uncles 13…what a blowout. Not wanting to leave before tasting fresh prawns, Lyn and I skewered two and popped them on a nearby BBQ pit. As we witness the prawns struggle on the heated grill, perhaps in pain, we felt a little guilty about cooking the prawns alive. Seriously, I could just see the poor seafood-to-be struggling while looking at me asking, “Why? Why me you sadistic bastard?!!”
Left and right: Our prawns says “Ouch”!!
But that thought quickly diminished as we savoured the prawns with a little pride. We finally caught our own food for once. Not wanting to be the selfish couple, we bagged the rest of the prawns and mercifully allowed it some time to die, before turning them into dinner for my family the next day. Yeap, the catch was good. We are looking forward to heading back there again.
Left: Our prawns preparing to be steamed | Right: Steamed prawns
More photos in my Flickr album.
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