Singer Shakira got quite a scare over the weekend when she got a little too close to a wild sea lion in Cape Town, South Africa.

The 34-year-old star was on a nature tour when she spotted a group of sea lions and seals. She moved in closer to take a photo and decided to pet one of them.

“Suddenly, one of them jumped out of the water so fast and impetuously that it got about one foot away from me, looked me in the eye, roared in fury and tried to bite me,” she wrote on her Facebook page.

Lucky for Shakira, her brother was there to save the day.

“Everyone there screamed, including me. I was paralyzed by fear and couldn’t move, I just kept eye contact with it while my brother ‘Super Tony’ jumped over me and literally saved my life, taking me away from the beast. We both got our hands and legs scratched by the rocks while trying to protect ourselves.”

Yikes!

Shakira thinks the attack was provoked by her cell phone: ““I believe what happened is that it confused the shiny reflection of the BlackBerry I was taking these pics with, with some sort of fish.”

Personally, I think there’s another lesson here: Wild animals don’t like it when the paparazzi gets in their face any more than celebrities do.

Megan Sayers is the managing editor for ModernMom. Follow her on Twitter @MeganSayers