The Carrot Goldfish

A long time ago, in a village far, far away me and my friend Gen played a trick on two of our friends. The trick wasn't great - more a bit of fun for a morning really - but due to a curious miss-identification it somehow managed to last for three years longer than it should have. Are you sitting comfortably?

Then ill begin:

Zil and The Caerphilly Mountain invited me, Gen and several others over to a house warming party in their newly purchased Cardiff abode. They had done some hard work renovating and decorating the place into a beautiful home and we gawped at the photos showing the carnage of just a few weeks before. The lounge, in particular, was decorated to perfection - all except one thing - a round, empty, fish tank that stood in the corner longing to be filled up with water and fish.

I don't recall the specifics of the party, but I know it was about 5 years ago, and so can, with some confidence, say that it involved a lot of beer, some non specific nibbles and a group of friends having 'a right laugh' as we called it back in them days.

In the morning, Zil and The Caerphilly Mountain had to get off to work, but were happy for Gen and me to make some brekkie before letting ourselves out. We did this, and upon noticing some rather splendidly fat carrots in the bottom of the fridge, Gen happened upon an idea: Lets make them some goldfish!

We spent the next hour converting the carrots into goldfish; we cut fins that plugged into the body, found some black peppercorns for eyes and carved a scale pattern onto both flanks. Gen's was amazing, mine even better. We filled up the tank and wedged its new inhabitants under some plants to stop them floating to the surface. The tank looked great and the light in the lid finished it off nicely, brightly illuminating the orange of the carrot goldfish.

I dont have any photos of the original, but google has offered me this effort, which is probably about similar to Gen's standard. Cute, but not realistic.

On the way home we texted Zil to say that 'We've bought you 2 housewarming presents and left them in the tank- you might want to get some food.' We giggled our way home, mock arguing over whose fish was the best.

Later that day Zil texted The Caerphilly Mountain saying she thought we had bought them some fish, so to get some fish food before going home. Zil herself was away with work for a couple of days so wouldn't be home to sort it out. The Caerphilly Mountain was also at work, but that evening bought some fish food on his way to the pub, where he proceeded to get absolutely battered. Staggering in, some hours later, he thought the new fish didn't look too well, and their lack of movement indicated to the inebriated Mountain that they were almost certainly dead. A removal of the plants, a pour down the toilet, and a flush, seemed to rapidly solve the problem, and The Mountain retired to his bed to restore the balance of power to the side of the sleep.

The morning saw a hungover Mountain reciting the previous evening events to Zil. The Mountain was sure the fish had died, probably because they were tropical fish in cold water, and that Gen and myself were a right couple of little tinkers for getting it wrong.

This news got transmitted to Gen a few days later by Zil via email. Gen forwarded it to me, and we both pondered what they were going on about. Could they really have mistaken our fakes for fish?..... Surely they're playing along?..... Yes, that's it, they were fucking with us. We decided to play along right back at them, replying, 'oh dear - we thought they were cold water fish, soooooo sorry :0('

The coming weeks saw The Mountain begin telling tales of his traumatic experience with the dead fish, really hamming it up, and relishing in the fact that I had bought tropical fish for a cold water tank. He found this fact particularly amusing because I was at the time studying to become a fish biologist. The Mountain had a good story and he was running with it. The emails 'Re: You Spakker' and texts began to come in.

Later that year Gen moved away to Hong Kong. For the good of the joke I was happy to take the abuse for a few years and I watched from the back rows as the story got passed around friends, elaborated on, and grew into something else. During the worse ribbing's I took solace in the knowledge that one day Gen would return with the truth. And return she did.

Zil couldn't believe it. The Caerphilly Mountain thought it was a joke. 'Noooooo. No way!' he said, the delight in my eyes slowly burning despair into his. Time had tricked him, consolidating a picture of two 'real' dead fish in his mind. It was a bitter pill to swallow but eventually Gen's sincerity convinced them and they accepted the truth - The Mountain had drunkenly mistaken our carrots to be dead tropical fish and given them a toilet bowl funeral.

Now I tell the story with a similar frequency that the Mountain used to, enjoying the fact that good things do come to those who wait.

(evil laugh) Ha Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha