Baby eel, shrimp, and bamboo

It has been a while since I did some serious home cooking, so I thought I should try something new. I went with Xiao An to the Wuliting market, which is bigger than the market near my home, but also quite close. They have some sea fish there, and fresh (in China that means live) shrimp, among many other delicacies.
We bought the shrimp (18 RMB a pound), alive and kicking in a plastic bag, and also a big handful of baby eel. I was a bit reluctant to get the eel, but Xiao An insisted. I knew what was going to happen to the poor fish. The vendor put the live eel in a plastic bag, tied it, and then slammed the bag a couple of times with force on the chopping board. This might have killed some of them, but most likely just made them unconscious for the next step: skinning.
For this procedure, the eel are slapped with their head on a sharpened nail which is fitted at the far side of the chopping board for this purpose. Hooked on the nail, the vendor slits the eel's skin with a sharp knife and pulls out the guts. One by one the eel are pinned to the board for this treatment, and then placed into a bowl for rinsing. It's a messy and bloody affair. Once rinsed, they are cut in smaller pieces, and handed over to the customer in a small plastic bag.
With the live shrimp and cut up eel in our hands, we picked some vegetables to accompany our meal. I spotted fresh bamboo shoots, which I love, and are a bit rare in the big city, so I was eager to get some. They were already cleaned, meaning the tough outer layers where removed, leaving the white conical shaped innards, ready for cooking. We also got some stringy small-leafed vegetable, which reminded me of water cress, but wasn't, a cucumber, some spring onions, and beautiful large leafed Thai basil (the kind with the sawtooth-edged big leafs which are green on one side and purple on the other).
At the moment of purchase I didn't actually know what to do with the baby eel, but while cycling home with everything in the front basket, and Xiao An on the back seat, I figured it out. I would just stir fry the eel in some peanut oil, add some finely chopped spring onion and garlic, some chili, and some Chinese cooking wine to simmer it off. Then dress up with some chopped basil before serving. Not much else to it.
The shrimp are easy, although it takes some courage to drop the live animals into a sizzling hot wok. They quickly stop moving though, once you stir it through.
I cut the bamboo shoots in thin slices, and stir fried them together with the remainder of the spring onion. Then I made a dressing of rice vinegar, chili sauce, and brown cane sugar for the cucumber I had chopped in long pieces, leaving the skin on, and sprinkled the remainder of the Thai basil on top.
The result was a simple, but delicious improvised dinner for two in the comfort of my home. Lovely!