I have been attached to weird sea creatures throughout my life. Probably it stems from my days in Malta, when my dad used to take us to the beach and taught us to catch snails, which later ended up on our dining table. They looked ugly alive, and even uglier on the dish. *

When I was into scuba diving in Japan, I was the only one crashing over crown-of-thorns starfish while everybody else was searching for cute sea slugs. The scuba instructor gave me the nickname King of Eccentricdom and we liked it so much we went around broadcasting it all over the diving groups. Before I knew it, I was attracting self-made marine biologists (men) and repelling bikini girls, for good.

Time passed and I became wise enough not to disclose my real taste too soon. But recently I have been subscribing to Authentic Realities and I had a moment: screw that, I am going to be real. So here is one of those baby steps: Five creatures that should give me the same effect as a pill of Ecstasy.

Nemertea Worm

Siphonophore

Blobfish

Tongue-eating louse

Frilled Shark

* Years later I re-visited the Mediterranean sea from the other side, on a beach in Israel. There were gigantic jellyfish–imagine transparent Domino pizza with extra topping–all over the place. Some   people ignored them, some poked them, and some did the Russian-roulette jellyfish catch. You know, the one who first catches it on the wrong side loses. And I reinforced my childhood nightmares.