Growing up in the countryside, a lot of my youth was spent swimming in lakes and rivers for as many summer days as the weather would provide. I had no fear of cannon-balling off high cliffs, I was never bothered by the scrapes of underwater rocks and boulders, and no matter how how fast the current, I was always up for a dip.
The one thing that freaked me out, though, was the feeling of sunfish that would creep up to take a taste of my toes. And when a few primary school friends and I watched Joe Dante's 1978 flick "Piranha" in an all-night horrorathon, my fish phobia was assured.
So when I first heard about the latest beauty fad in Japan in which fish eat away dead skin cells from your hands and feet, I shuddered in fear and disgust.