May I have 8 Prawns please?

B1 came home one day saying his colleague extolled on the pleasures of eating fresh prawns in medicinal soup. Since I hate prawns (that includes even prawns cooked in the same vegetable dish), it was a painful ordeal for me to even touch them. I went to the supermarket (I still hadn't summoned enough courage to visit the seafood and poultry sections in the wet market then yet). 

So I bought them at the nearby Shop and Save. I went to the seafood counter where I bewildered the counter staff and the auntie shoppers next to me when I replied "May I have 8 prawns please?" to the counter staff's "what do you want, girl?"

The expression of the auntie next to me was priceless. I later described it to my Eltern as a "WTF are you buying prawns if you are so fucking poor" face. Well, it isn't because I am poor (then again I am), it's because I thought 8 prawns were just enough for B1. 

"Who orders 8 prawns!?" My Vater lacht. He later said "next time ask them how much half a kg costs then order about 200-300g"

B1 was delighted that I bought the prawns but he refused to help clean them. So leery, I clipped each prawn gingerly and snipped off its horn and feelers. Ew.

I prepared the soup first. I chucked in some slices of ginseng that I had left over from the Samgyetang I made the other time, wolfberries, huai san, and garlic slices. Quick boil until I could smell the ginseng. I chucked the prawns in, and doused the flames. I also poured in some soya sauce to taste and a little bit of chinese wine.

"Eh..." B1 said when he saw the prawns.

"What's wrong?"

"I wanted steamed prawns in medicinal soup, not boiled." He also said he did not like prawn soup, so my soup was totally wasted on him.

If I had poured the soup over his head, I think no one would have blamed me. He said that that same colleague praised steamed prawns over boiled prawns, but that steamed prawns would have some strange egg-like consistency in the heads.