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Did you see the story about the Chinese man who died after his friends inserted a live eel into his rectum as a practical joke when the man was asleep?

http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/content.php?sid=2778

This tragic situation, which I think we all agree is not funny, raises many questions.

 1. With friends like that, who needs enemas?  

2. How low did this man set the bar for friends?  

3. What were his friends imbibing when they came up with this idea, and how can I get some of that?  

4. How difficult is it to insert an eel into a rectum? Did they straighten and freeze the eel a little bit first? Otherwise it seems like trying to push a rope through a keyhole.  

5. How did the man sleep through it? 

In my own life, I have a strict rule for determining who to call my friends. Rule 46 states that any person who tries to insert a live eel into my rectum is automatically disqualified. If the eel is dead, obviously that's just good fun. I'm not a killjoy.

As a conspiracy enthusiast, I have to wonder if the friends were trying to cover up an even more embarrassing violation of the presumably drunken victim's hindquarters.

Friend 1: "Uh-oh. When he wakes up, he's going to know what we did."

Friend 2: "Not if we put a live octopus in his rectum. That should cover our tracks."

Friend 1: "That's insane! You can't put a live octopus in a rectum!"

Friend 2: "Live eel?"

Friend 1: "Fine. Remind me to never be the first one who falls asleep in this crowd."

 
Rank Up Rank Down Votes:  +109
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-1 Rank Up Rank Down
May 9, 2010
Everybody is ignorant about a lot of things. Including thing they know they know. I saw on a TV show what was said to be a dying woman whose brain being eaten by land snails. Not flukes. Why the flame. Just say its not so, ok?
 
 
May 9, 2010
d4d continues to be ignorant:
================================
Snails have eggs. A Animal Planet Show said it first, not me. Do you still feel superior? It's believed that using fire to cook and kill the little dears let humans make the big leap up.
================================

Ah, so it was on TV. Whatever. Just because snail eggs were in the (highly acidic) digestive system doesn't mean they can magically get into the blood (circulatory system) and even if they did, they won't pass through the blood-brain barrier. I guarantee that no-one has EVER had tiny snails eating their brains (even if their brains were exposed to the air and snails were placed directly on them...)

Perhaps you misunderstood what you saw on TV (probably happens to you every time you turn on the TV). Perhaps they were talking about Angiostrongylus cantonensis (a nematode, sometimes called "Rat Lungworm") that can be present in certain snails (and also some freshwater prawns, crabs, other mollusks, drinking water, and even unwashed veggies that have come in contact with infected slugs or snails, etc.) This nematode can cause eosinophilic meningitis.

Many people have this parasite and are asymptomatic...

Focusing on a German is very Western-centric, as it happens far more often in the Far East and tropical Africa...
 
 
0 Rank Up Rank Down
May 9, 2010
Scott's enema pun was good, but I think Shadowrider gets my vote for Best Pun with 'That's a moray!'

And yes, the name Practical Fishkeeping seems hopelessly inaccurate with regards to this story.
 
 
+1 Rank Up Rank Down
May 9, 2010
I bet the eel wanted in to get away from the hands holding it. I saw on a nature show that holding a black bag open and scaring a cobra will send it into the bag.
 
 
+1 Rank Up Rank Down
May 9, 2010
Some years go I read of a ER Doc getting a award for a method of casting plaster around light bulbs so they could be removed with less danger of breaking. Yes from there.
 
 
-2 Rank Up Rank Down
May 9, 2010
Snails have eggs. A Animal Planet Show said it first, not me. Do you still feel superior? It's believed that using fire to cook and kill the little dears let humans make the big leap up.
 
 
May 8, 2010
Jordenne sez:
=======================
Sorry, there is no way to "push a rope through a keyhole" without a willing keyhole. The story was likely concocted to preserve the reputation of a now dead man whose parents, wife, and children didn't need to live with the knowledge that their son/husband/father died from a felching fetish.

Ockham's Razor plain and simple. Extremely funny yes, but definitely not a prank on an unknowing victim.
=======================

Just because YOU don't understand how it was done doesn't mean it can't be done by someone more clever than you (perhaps a majority of people?) (Sounds like a Creationist argument: "I don't understand how it could possibly happen naturally, therefore it is CLEARLY done by God." They can't design computers but still manage to use them to proudly demonstrate their lack of reasoning...)

To anyone that follows urban legends (to even a minor degree), the method of insertion should be quite clear. Thanks to the UL about Richard Gere and the gerbil, we know that you insert a tube with a diameter greater than the eel and then slide the eel in through the tube. I assume with some salt water to KEEP it alive for a while. (By pouring the eel into the tube with some water the "friends" don't risk getting bit...)
 
 
May 8, 2010
d4d sez:
=====================
That's bad. But did you see on TV the German guy who proved how high class he was by feeding his girl large live snails? She lasted 4 days with VERY small snails eating her brain. He made it a few hours longer.
=====================

I hope you're just a troll trying to freak someone out, but if not you are clearly an idiot. What you describe is physically impossible...
 
 
-2 Rank Up Rank Down
May 8, 2010
That's bad. But did you see on TV the German guy who proved how high class he was by feeding his girl large live snails? She lasted 4 days with VERY small snails eating her brain. He made it a few hours longer.
 
 
May 7, 2010
Scott, what I want to know is how these types of stories come to your attention in the first place. Do you have a bunch of Google news alerts set up for words like "rectum", "eels", "beheading", etc? You seem to find a lot more of these stories than I do.
 
 
May 6, 2010
When your friends are really crass
and there's an eel up your ass,
That's a moray!
 
 
May 6, 2010
Dear god, why did I have to read this?

I hope those !$%*!$%* get the death penalty.
 
 
May 6, 2010
According to this article, and for future reference, the appropriate size is 50cm for an intestine eating, rectally inserted swamp eel.
 
 
May 6, 2010
The eel lived long enough to gnaw the man's intestines. Hardly little buggers. Of course it was also probably a little pissed after getting a face full of poo so I can't blame it.
 
 
May 6, 2010
I may be alone on this one, but the funniest part to me is that this story about a clearly non-standard eel storage method is being reported in Practical Fishkeeping.

I can only assume it is meant as a cautionary tale to circumvent that all too human instinct put things in things. Or as our pediatrician calls it, "container play".
 
 
May 6, 2010
Was the eel asleep during this process too?!? No matter how irresponsible your friends are, they have to realize that something is a bad idea if the eel is biting them and biting their friends cheeks as they are trying to push this thing through the gate. Surely if they were so loaded that they didn't clue into this, they should have been passed out themselves...

I've gotta agree with the conspiracy that they were trying to hide something else.


Friend 1: "This will teach him to fall asleep first, I fit 5 goldfish up his rectum"

Friend 2: "It'll be hilarious when he shoots those out tomorrow"

Friend 1: "What else can we put up there?"

Friend 2: "Live eel?"
 
 
May 6, 2010
Can Wally email me the video?
 
 
+11 Rank Up Rank Down
May 6, 2010
According to the article..."Doctors who performed a post mortem on him found the eel in his rectum where it had reportedly gnawed at his intestines, causing heavy internal bleeding". You can hardly blame the eel though, you eat a little Chinese and you are hungry an hour or two later.
 
 
May 6, 2010
I'm sure it was even funnier in Chinese.
 
 
May 6, 2010
And the third paragraph of the story:

Practical Fishkeeping reported a very similar story last year in which a medical journal revealed that a man had suffered from rectum, intestine and spleen damage following the insertion of a 50cm swamp eel which he claimed was introduced to "relieve constipation."

And yes, at the hospital where I used to work, we had a guy come in with his partner who was berating him for shoving a phone up whilst it was switched to vibrate.

I'm glad I wasn't the nurse/doctor assigned to get that one out.
 
 
 
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