Video: Seafood Shop Caught Sticking Googly Eyes on Old Fish in Bid to Make Them Seem Fresher

A fish shop in Kuwait has reportedly been closed down after it was caught sticking googly eyes onto old fish.

Spotted by local newspaper al-Bayan, the store's owner was alleged to have stuck the googly eyes on to hide that the fish were several days old. The shop was shut down by the Department of Commerce, according to the local news outlet. A video was uploaded to YouTube of a customer finding—and removing—the fake eyes.

The story has been widely shared on social media, drawing responses of humor and disbelief. "That picture of the googly eye falling off the fish is making me laugh so hard and I don't know why as it is soooo gross," one person wrote on Twitter. "They really took the time to go out to a store and buy google eyes and stick one into each individual eye of every fish they sold just for one to fall off accidentally," another person said.

The woman in the video can be seen wearing gloves as she removes a googly eye to reveal a yellow, naturally-aged eye of a fish.

There were also plenty of puns coming out online. "Sadly, due to an unsettling odor, 'Google eye, for the fish guy' was not renewed for next season," was one, matched only by: "Freshness is in the googly eye of the beholder." One person really went all out: "There's something fishy about all of this. Who are they codding? Maybe they need to be put in their plaice."

Given the amount of fish caught that are never eaten, there is perhaps an argument to be made for the shop. According to a report published by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in July, marine populations are suffering from overfishing.

A third of the world's fish stocks are overfished and about 35 percent of fish caught for food are never eaten. It's predicted that hotter temperatures around the world will also drive fish away from warm tropical waters, where nations rely on seafood.

Most of this waste is due to the product rotting because of poor refrigeration or human error. Some of the fish are also thrown back because they are the wrong species or are too small to go to market.

"Food waste on a hungry planet is outrageous," Lasse Gustavsson, executive director of ocean conservancy nonprofit Oceana, told The Guardian. "The fact that one-third of all fish caught goes to waste is a huge cause for concern for global food security."