Mandy's formative years were spent in the velds and forests of the Northern Transvaal collecting shongololos and pulling the wings off insects.
She was fascinated by it, told anyone who was willing to listen, and abandoned her mission to seek and pry open shongololos.
The kids have also produced a range of beautiful, whimsical mobiles of chameleons, shongololos, birds, fish, stars and planets made out of junk and found objects.
The number of legs touching the ground depends on the speed at which the shongololo needs to move.
But it doesn't matter, I saw a shongololo and that was cool.
It was the weirdest thing, the shongololo was crawling across the floor and when I touched it it curled into its typical little curl.