So Son Tai being a crumbly sort of place I had a comedy accident late one night whilst trying to get up some make shift steps. Net result was I grazed my shin. Ouch. With some baking in the sun the next day it started to dry out and soon was covered with a thick crusty oozing scab. Lovely.
A couple of days later we decided to go on a boat trip. The usual sort of thing, tootle around the islands, bit of snorkelling, spot of lunch, you get the idea.
I'm not the worlds strongest swimmer – no doubt due to living in a big city most of my adult life – so when it came to the snorkelling I was floundering around trying to do that strange aquatic juggling act of spitting in the mask, get the snorkel the right way round and into my mouth whilst simultaneously treading water. I imagine I looked as graceful as an octopus in a washing machine.
I finally got my proverbial act together and started floating around peering at the fish. Once I'd relaxed a little bit I started to enjoy myself.
The staff on the boat throw biscuits into the water to attract the fish and one landed near me. The fish swarmed around, periodically bumping my mask. Very cool.
I suddenly felt a strange tingling on my leg. I couldn't quite work out what it was. I twisted my head around to get a view of my leg. The fish were swarming around my shin, seemingly feeding on it.
'Jesus, they're eating my leg!' Mild panic set in until I realised it didn't actually seem to hurt.
I hauled my leg up and they followed it. Looking closer I could see what was going on, they were nibbling at the scab on my shin, chewing little bits off.
When I got out of the water I had a perfectly cleaned wound.
It's healing nicely, thanks fish!