Half a Bunny and the Salmon of Doubt

Animals on Changi shore doing well after oil spill

2010-05-30T22:24:00.015+08:00

Sunrise, 30 May 2010, Changi Beach, Singapore

After the depressing news first broke that two oil tankers collided, resulting in massive oil leakage off the coast of Changi East, concerned marine volunteers have been investigating the damage to the nearby intertidal shore, while authorities have closed beaches to the public, and frantic clean up efforts have been deployed.

Perhaps most painful to see and hear were reports from volunteers that the slick had hit Ubin's Chek Jawa, a protected area with a beautiful mangrove intertidal, as well as Changi Beach.

I scrounged up what little time I had amid a packed working weekend to see just how badly Changi Beach had been affected -- I made my way to a stretch of Changi Beach that had not been reported in the news yet -- and was relieved to be greeted with a relatively healthy shore. While this stretch of shore may not be representative of Changi Beach considering how long the whole beach really is, it was a real relief to still see all these beautiful animals alive and well, minding their own business. I do hope the oil does not spread to this stretch and any further.

It was early morning low tide, and seemed like just any other quiet morning, save for a heavy smell of petroleum in the air.

Other than that damper, and murkier than usual water, plenty of animals were out to play:

Many thorny sea cucumbers had their tentacles outstretched, feeding.

These pink sand dollars were also abundant.

This nervous moon crab was still feeding even though the sun was up and it was all bright and warm.

A beached sea hare.

Plenty of feisty crabs out and about.

More sea cucumbers.

Peachia anemones were also spotted further up the shore.

A few nervous peacock anemones were also feeding.

A pretty pencil urchin.

A beautiful dragonet.

Migrating brittlestar.

Another hermit crab.

Plenty of clams.

This healthy windowpane shell was sheltering a fierce little swimming crab.

Large sand collar of eggs.

Another sea cucumber that was abundant.

These white urchins were also everywhere.

While the animals encountered were not in their usual abundance, compared to the previous trips made there, they were healthy-looking. There were also no large numbers of animal carcasses either. I'm hopeful for this stretch of shore and I really hope the oil doesn't spread anymore.

Want to do your part in this disaster? Read how you can contribute here.

Trump Card

2010-01-20T11:59:00.005+08:00

Mum bought herself a lump of steel from some fancy german shop. It now sits in its own customised "soap dish" in her bathroom.

Claiming to possess amazing odour-removal properties, this lump of steel must be used under running water for it to work. Dad also believes in it and claims that it really removes smells from his hands.

Anyway, since none of us can fathom the scientific logic behind its mystical powers (how Mum and Dad are scientists is beyond me at this point), my brother and I have decided that it makes for amusing arguments.

"I saw it at Daiso going for $2 -- you got cheated."
"Why don't you just rub your hands on the kitchen sink?"
"Just put a spoon in every bathroom."
My favourite: "Mum, as long as you're using that lump of steel soap, you have no credibility!"

Shellfish and the mass fish deaths

2010-01-04T18:07:00.005+08:00

During the last few days, good low tides have coincided with the new year holidays -- this means lots of people at the beach! Seriously now, going for a cycle along East Coast Park and Changi Beach during the long weekend would have been a feat fraught with peril: peril of colliding with children, picnic mats and stray soccer balls.

This means there's also lots of people out to explore the shore when the low tide exposed much of the intertidal. Most people were out enjoying the expansive shore, sadly, many were there poaching.

This is a huge sack of oysters chiseled off the sea walls of East Coast.

A man collected these huge clams from the shore and was hawking them to passersby along Changi Beach.

Given the recent reports of mass fish deaths and unhealthy waters off Pasir Ris, Changi and Ubin, shellfish like clams and oysters which are filter-feeders are probably the last things you'd want to eat! Some toxins cannot be denatured by cooking, and goodness knows should some poor sod eat those oysters raw :O

Fig snail!

2010-01-03T20:09:00.007+08:00

Oh boy! I'm so thrilled to see a live and FAT, juicy-looking fig snail at East Coast this evening at low tide! We sometimes encounter their empty shells on our shores, sometimes inhabited by hermit crabs.

At first I couldn't figure out what it was, just because I'd never seen it alive before. It was about 10 to 12cm long or more. It also kept doing yoga moves. From what I understand, the fig snail is rarely seen alive.

Strangely, it was not burrowing, but wandering stranded on the exposed sand bar, making it easy to spot.

It also refused to retract for me to observe its shell.

The fig snail's siphon is very long, giving the snail a fruit-like shape. (I would have called it the pear snail if it were up to me.) The shell's fig shape is what gives it its name. I'm very pleased to finally see this elusive snail alive.

Ticked off!

2009-11-22T02:41:00.005+08:00

That is a tick. Yes, the same kind that you pick off your dogs and go "ewww". Except I picked this thing off myself. And it is less than 1mm wide, so on my leg, it looked like a nondescript mole, or even a blackhead.

Here's some sense of perspective for you: this is said tick on a square of toilet paper.

And I had 6 of these. And I never suspected having them, inspite of nagging prickling stings I felt all day. And after all this time, they'd established some kind of adamantine grip on my skin that picking them off was quite a chore -- I had to squeeze them off and pick off some skin in the process.

You see, this is both horrifying and amusing -- yes amusing, because at one point last night, in the forest off Venus Drive, when James and I were squatting under a branch waiting in the stillness of the night for our 30-second exposures to complete, he says something like "Ok, so we're here, keeping still, in the middle of the jungle. I wonder what could get us now." and I went something like "Mosquitoes lor. As long as not ticks la. That would be gross."

Ah.

This is what we were waiting for though, completely worth the harrowing experience of picking off ticks one day late: a glowing aboreal mushroom.

How pretty!

You know, at least we didn't get a whole leg full like Siyang and co. when they ventured off the trail at Bukit Timah Hill. That's really gross!

Without regret

2009-11-12T22:59:00.006+08:00

Vik, a tiny town at the southern tip of Iceland, boasts a famous cluster of cliffs and stacks called Reynisdrangar visible from the expansive black beach, permanently obscured by a fog of sea spray that engulfs the entire coast with an inpenetrable, milky lens. The beach probably knows no such thing as a breeze, its entire length misted with a haze stirred wildly by the turbulent open water that crashes heavily onto the rugged Icelandic coastline, wild as her violent geologic past. Braving the biting wind that makes even opening the eyes a painful struggle, and then in a moment, drawing in deeply, the cold, damp Icelandic air - it leaves you wanting, feeling small, weak, afraid.

Beautiful silence

2009-11-12T22:28:00.005+08:00

Jokulsarlon, a glacier lagoon in south Iceland, is stunning in countless ways. Most breathtaking, perhaps, is its deafening silence punctuated with the gentle dripping purrs of the ice melting, while your serene reverence for the almost holy atmosphere can suddenly be shaken by a crack of shattering ice, followed by a satisfying splash of water. The soft rippling stirred by playful seals is only rudely interrupted by the half-hourly amphibious ride that clumsily ferries shivering tourists into the lagoon. And to the relief of the awestruck wanderer strolling by the black sand bank, it quickly disappears behind the larger ice floes. He is grateful for the luxury of crisp, peaceful silence.

Kind of a sad hermit crab

2009-11-10T21:52:00.004+08:00

Almost as sad as Angus. Very clumsily plodding about on Pulau Hantu, this anemone's hermit crab has obviously chosen to overestimate its own prowess. Probably wasn't too wise to hang on to this shell, it's more anemone than shell, really. The good news is that he's probably going to be one of the last choices on any predator's menu.

Actually, it's kind of a sad anemone. Dragging around this pimple of a hermit crab, living out its days dreaming it would taste the sweet ocean that lies beyond this tiny lagoon, if only he'd picked a larger shell to settle on to begin with...

Public Fornication

2009-10-22T14:49:00.005+08:00

Locked in a passionate embrace, partaking in the world's favourite pastime, this pair of fornicating horseshoe crabs were a surprising encounter at East Coast. Literally stumbled upon, the arthropod lovers were oblivious to the oohs and aahs of Ivan and I as we cheered them on in high spirits, pleased to have found them on our otherwise quiet morning of hermit crabs, moon snails, acorn worms, moon crabs and marine trash.

Angus the humungous fungus

2009-09-02T15:28:00.001+08:00

Never did have any friends.

Little Sister's Island, revisited.

2009-08-26T21:56:00.006+08:00

Wow, it has been 2 years since I last visited Little Sister's Island but I still remember all the funny critters we'd encountered back then. This time, we were there with "anemone people" who were studying frilly anemones -- so in between photographing critters, we looked out for these normally abundant anemones and hollahed when we saw them. We had terrible luck finding them until much later into the trip, and the tide was already threatening to claim our sorry lives by then.

It was a quiet day for marine critters that morning, in the small lagoon, I encountered this lone peacock anemone, looking very forlorn.

In the lagoons, fishies were everywhere! While ambushing a very shy reef crab, I spied this pretty pinkish scorpion fish pretending to be invisible.

This filefish lolled past as Kok Sheng called me to join him outside the lagoon.

And I encountered a number of these mystery fish:

The team trotted up to the famous giant clam that resides in one of the lagoons and had a nice time examining it before Mei Lin set up her transect.

Over at the reef near the seawall, there were many beautiful finds. Ivan bothered to double back and hunt for this featherstar just so I could take a look at it. It's gorgeous.

I encountered another feather star nearby.

It soon turned out that this stretch of shore is feather star central! Kok Sheng and Geraldine brave the very scary reef edge to eyeball the many red feather stars that gathered there, treacherously dangling off the side of the deep drop, where we all know the deadly undercurrents of Sister's islands have claimed lives.

There were also a number of black sea cucumbers.

The shore was teeming with octopussies!

Sadly, the only nudibranch we encountered was this polkadotted Jorunna nudibranch that Kok Sheng found. We all quietly complained that we needed Chay Hoon with us.

Kok Sheng found this huge arabian cowrie! My first time seeing it in real life. What a kick I got from observing it.

Over on the reef, I spotted a number of these wandering cowries too.

Stepping with much caution, negotiating the coral rubble of the reef and the edge of the lagoon, I nearly had a heart attack thinking of all the recent encounters with stinging animals on the shore that the other beach fleas had! Fortunately, it was an accident-free trip. And in between appreciating all the pretty things on the reef, we were treated to a gorgeous sunrise over Big Sister's Island. :)

Training the cat

2009-08-13T09:40:00.006+08:00

We read somewhere that to train the cat to walk on a leash takes a number of stages:

Put the cat in a harness for, say, a week for it to get comfortable with wearing one
Attach a leash to the harness and allow the cat to walk around the house with it for a few days
Attach a human to the other end of the leash and allow the cat walk around the house with it for a few days
Finally try that outdoors

Dirty is at stage 1 now. I feel slightly bad for her to have the extra thing on her 24hours a day, but it doesn't seem to bother her very much now. She slunk a lot at first though, it was hilarious stuff. I think a bit of outdoors would make her less grumpy, don't you think? Can't wait for cat walks. Just the thought of it cracks me up!

Slugging at St John's

2009-08-09T23:18:00.008+08:00

I love pre-dawn trips and the sun rise is one of the many reasons why.

This morning we visited St John's island again and this time, I wanted to explore more of the reef since the last visit ended with rain. This time I managed to cover the reef closest to the jetty but wtf my camera battery dies just as I reached the end.

It was a sluggy morning! Nudibranchs were all out and about.

Chay Hoon's bionic eyes led to many micro-finds, especially tiny tiny slugs. Those I don't even bother with, and leave it to the people with the macro lenses to tackle. Here, she spotted a nudibranch that was grazing on sea grapes!

I saw 2 of these large nudibranchs beached and looking very sad. James helped rescue them.

Back in water, they looked relaxed and much more beautiful. Look at those gills!

More nudis! They are so gorgeous.

A nice fat polka-dotted nudibranch.

James spotted these tiny nuzzling pyjama-striped nudibranchs.

There were also a number of these flat worms.

A scorpionfish? It hid in very murky water so we couldn't get a decent picture of it.

Fan worms were also quite common here.

Another flat worm.

There were many other feisty creatures! This shy giant reef worm barely let me focus on him before he retreated speedily with a mouthful of sargassum!

There were also many black-lipped conches on this shore.

Octopussies!

This is the strange crab I was talking about. I don't know if it was a moult since I didn't poke it.

I saw so many of these "condylactus not"s!! I love these guys. They are so elusive and shy.

There were also many other interesting anemones!

The variation of frilly anemones is quite amazing.

And then the camera died. I'm sure the others in the team would have lots more to share about this trip!

Pasir Ris is sinking (ok not really)

2009-08-09T22:33:00.011+08:00

We went from fresh and clean to really muddy in a matter of minutes during our pre-dawn foray onto the Pasir Ris mud flat yesterday. We should have known really, but well. Sometimes we never learn. Soon after we ventured out and started sinking into the mud, James decided he had to hide his equipment in his waterproof bag before attempting to crawl out.

After I sank something like 10 times, my pants were suitably weighed down by mud up to my thighs. (This brings me back to field trip days down at Chek Jawa when we were still allowed onto the mudflat. Oh, sweet waist-deep mud.)

But the trip was worth it, albeit tiring. Despite the physical exertion of having to drag oneself out of mud many times, we saw many interesting animals!

This blue hermit crab was trying to move house, unfortunately the snail was still alive.

This bearded mudskipper gamely posed for pictures.

The shore was absolutely riddled with these tiny anemones.

How exciting! Kok Sheng spotted this large dog-faced watersnake.

We ambushed a few feeding tube worms. This guy had a tiny crab for a hat.

Tiny whelks carried tiny anemones on their shells.

Sand stars were also abundant here.

Lots of Haddon's carpet anemones as well.

A bitten biscuit star.

Everyone was covered in mud.

Ball sea cucumbers were everywhere!

As if by some flight of black magic, Kok Sheng managed to summon a cake sea star. I swear, I was right there.

A stranded snapping shrimp.

As we gave up on getting stuck every few steps of the way, we made our way back to the high shore. Exploring the mangrove area, we ambushed the many fumbling fiddler crabs.

Sun rise!

This fiddler crab was trying to flee as we neared, unfortunately he'd picked a burrow occupied by a rival male that very effectively blocked his way!

My exclamation of "Dead toad!" piqued Ivan's morbid senses as he bounced over saying something about good for Monday Morgue.

On the bridge at Pasir Ris park, we encountered this macaque that was fiddling and humping a pong pong fruit, obviously very used to humans taking his picture.

It was muddy but enjoyable. If only my butt didn't ache so much from crawling out of the mud so many times!

At least there were no sandflies.

Special animals all over St John's Island!

2009-07-14T21:45:00.010+08:00

Stephen cups a fiddler crab that was running up his pants. Hilarious.

Off to St John's island! On Saturday, we headed out before sunrise and hit the rocky shore with our torchlights and cameras. Before we knew it, daylight had dawned but we'd missed the sunrise that was obscured by the cliff behind us. The rocky shore of St John's Island had many surprises, big and small. Sometimes incredibly tiny, like this teeny tiny brittle star I accidentally happened across under a rock. Its oral disk was something like, less than 0.5cm in diameter.

I caught a top shell on the move!

Woo! What have we here?

My find of the day!! This wiggly star anemone that's got pretty pink and green bands on its tentacles! There's also a stray brittle star arm in this shot. I was fortunate to get this picture because this anemone was so nervous, an attempt to advance made it promptly retract. From experience in previous anemone trips, we can wait til the cows come home but it won't come out to let you peer at it until next Christmas. Actually, we just call it a wiggly star anemone, but it's not yet been identified! We should check with Dr Daphne, anemone expert, when she visits us again this week for more anemone expeditions!

The rocky shore was teeming with these cowries too!

Here, I prodded a floral egg crab in hiding.

A few fan worms were up and about.

The shore was abundant with these magnifica carpet anemones! They are huge, but I didn't spot any anemone fishes or shrimps that day.

A super long ribbon worm greeted Ivan and I in the middle of nowhere when we were busy poking nudibranchs!

These are the mysterious orange nudibranchs in question.

Nearby, a tiny polkadotted nudibranch crawled about. It was so tiny, there were hardly any polkadots on its body! Aw, cute.

Aiyoh, before we knew it, a storm was headed our way! Ominous clouds formed above and sheets of rain could be seen in the distance, pelting down on the islands nearby.

There's sisters' islands in the background, under looming storm clouds, while the team was oblivious, engrossed in taking pictures of a phyllid nudibranch!

This nudibranch.

We fled to shelter as the rain started to fall. When it slowed to a drizzle, we headed back out, this time to the sandy lagoon. Here, I saw this strange moon snail with dark markings. Nobody knows what it is.

These nerites have colonised a dead oyster.

We were very enamoured with this conch which I started calling a "special gong gong" because it looks like a gong gong... but special. The markings on the shell and the wavy lip makes it very mesmerising.

Kok Sheng drew my attention to the patterned siphon. Very cute. I really like how innocent gong gong eyes are. Adorable.

Here's a stranded fiddler that Stephen fingered. So cute!

Have you cupped your crab today?

James has some amazing pictures of his finds on this trip!

On the ride back, loony boys obviously got a bad case of stupox as they... tried to slow the boat down by creating drag with their ponchos. No, not really. Actually Kok Sheng came up with this really innovative way of drying his poncho on the way back to mainland, so that it's dry by the time we dock, AND he doesn't have to mess up his home hanging it out to dry! Amazing! Ivan of course, joins in.

It was unfortunate that our trip was interuppted by rain, I would have loved to see more of the rocky shore! There's always interesting critters to observe.

Rock and reflexology on Lazarus Island

2009-07-05T14:00:00.009+08:00

As the rest of the team explored the natural beaches of Lazarus, I trekked through the coastal forest to the rocky shore facing St John's island to check it out while the low tide was still good. This shore is vastly different from the reclaimed bay I'd just come from! Climbing down the seawall, the soft mushy part of the shore had little fiddler crabs scurrying about, being busy intimidating each other with their Big Useless Claw.

Braving the rather precarious rocky rubble of this shore, I was so lucky to spot this giant reef worm emerging from its burrow. Ugly!!

The iridescent body is rather captivating though, I must admit. These worms are very shy even though they look very scary, and feed mostly on algae tufts.

All over the shore, corals were thriving. I didn't get a picture of the large mats of leathery soft coral though, meh.

Frilly phymanthus anemones were also in abundance. This was like, Phymanthus Central.

These tiny colonial button anemones were also common.

Up on the high shore, pooping Onch slugs were everywhere.

There is this small fishery just off the rocky shore. Behind you can see the causeway with many people also fishing.

Goodness, by now we'd been walking about for almost 4 hours in the hot sun! Exhausted, Ria slacks off on the high shore on a rock obviously made for sitting upon, duh.

Thoroughly shagged out, we trudged back to the seawall through the last stretch of rocky shore which is really like, very hard core foot reflexology. It was bad, it slowed Ivan down so much that he nearly missed the boat back!! Haha.. We all got sore, painful feet, but it was worth it!

Life in a man-made bay on Lazarus Island

2009-07-04T12:53:00.014+08:00

Last Sunday we headed out just before sunrise towards our Southern Islands and were greeted with the fat, red sun, peeking over the horizon as we approached Lazarus Island. What a lovely view!

Lazarus Island is part of the cluster of Southern Islands including Sisters' and St John's, and is now linked to the latter by a causeway. Once considered for development into a luxury resort cluster, Lazarus and the other Southern Islands have since been spared from certain concretisation as plans seem to be on hold.

As we clambered onto the island over the slippery algae-covered pontoon, we were warmly welcomed by this sign, erected all over the quiet island, warning leisure-seekers of its ulu-ness. Yup, no toilets or concrete paths, that's exactly my kind of stuff!

Just next to the jetty was this abandoned pile of very new-looking fishing net. :/

We made our way to the man-made lagoon Seringat-Kias, a sandy bay which at first sight, seems devoid of life.

Some rich kids pulled up in a boat and set up shop with their dogs for a relaxing morning of suntanning.

The happy doggies were very adorable. The terriers even had life-jackets.

There was some marine trash in this bay and it was both amusing and ridiculous, they kind of trash I encountered, like these goggles,

Sunglasses,

...a shoe.

...and a bicycle pedal!

But this seemingly clinical beach was full of life if you knew where to look! All over the bay were whelks, hermit crabs and tiny dubious nerites. I was fascinated with the variety of colours and patterns they sported.

They are very small too, something like about 0.5cm.

There were many tiny worms in the sand too.

Common sea stars were also in abundance.

As were the fish!

Here's a pretty flathead trying to be invisible. I like flatheads, I think they are one of the cutest fish.

A very cute silver whiting also trying to be invisible.

Near the sea wall, loads of oysters were growing. Here, an orange fan worm attached to a mound of oysters displayed its tentacles, filtering food particles from the water.

In the middle of nowhere was this seemingly stranded ghost crab. I checked and it was alive, but seemed a bit lost. These crabs are usually nocturnal and would bury themselves or scurry away at danger. Perhaps this one is sick or dying.

In the muddy (and very sinkable area) of the bay were lots of sea grasses, and these gum-drop ascidians grew in abundance.

Scattered along the bay, I spotted 4 of these banded peachia anemones.

Out and about in broad daylight were also these moon snails.

There were also these pink moon snails on the move.

Plenty of sand dollars were out and about.

And this sea cucumber was spotted in the muddy sea grass area near the seawall too. Ria says she's only seen this in Changi. So yay~ for another record.

There was also in the middle of nowhere, a clump of zebra coral!

This reclaimed bay seems to be full of life inspite of its clinical appearance! Look out for part 2 of the exploration of Lazarus as we check out the rocky shore on the other side of the island proper.

Wet on Jong

2009-06-26T10:13:00.011+08:00

Wednesday morning, we headed out just before sunrise to catch Pulau Jong at low tide. Jong is a tiny tiny outcrop of an island situated somewhere between Semakau and Bukom. It is so small, you only see a tuft of green foliage exposed in the middle of nowhere, with swooping sea eagles gracefully circling the island. But at low tide, a reef flat is exposed, and we attempted our amphibious landing at this time, just when day broke.

As we fumbled across the intertidal towards the cliff, we noticed a scary storm in the distance. Sheets of rain partially cloaked the brown haze in the distance.

Knowing the storm might just be making its way over to where we were, we hurriedly carried on. Here you can see Sebarok in the distance, from which an odour of petroleum extruded. Meh.

The reef is abundant with soft corals and funny little hairy crabs. Sadly, this cute hiding red eye reef crab was the only crab I got a picture of.

Nearby, a large flatworm went about its business.

This strange tiny eel (?) caught my eye. It was very busy poking around the sand, rather violently tearing at the undersides of rocks.

As usual, gobies were in abundance. I find them very adorable.

A marine spider tried to run away from me! Understandble, of course.

Another flatworm -- these guys were fairly common on Jong!

How many gobies are there in this picture?

Alas, less than an hour from landing and the stupid storm reached us. Cold, windy, wet, miserable. We mucked around the high shore while the rain pelted down, waiting for some reprieve (that did not come). The tide was about to turn so we decided to just call for our ride and FLEE!

Back on the boat, everyone looked suitably ridiculous. Soggy, cold, and flourescent.

Ivan picked something off his bootie that turned out to be a tiny hitchhiking spider crab!

Well. Shivering and damp, we bade farewell to Jong. That's our little dinghy the White Bunny. Aww.

Back at the marina, we eyeballed the ostentatious over-consumption of the privileged class.

...that are very creative at naming their rides.

This was my favourite: the Sea Duction. *chortle*

That's our little boat...

... next to the huge thing called the White Rabbit.

Noordin mangroves and the elusive Sea Durian

2009-06-15T22:51:00.007+08:00

This is not my first time seeing the Sea Durian. My first time was when I saw one washed ashore at Changi Beach -- the first specimen I've seen that was intact and covered in kelp! I must write about that some day. Here's a close-up:

I joined Ria and team up at the northern shore of Ubin, Noordin Beach, to explore the mangroves there at low tide yesterday. The sun was out, it was blazing hot, and the soft squishy animals were hiding. Like these nerite snails I peeked at in a deep rock crevice.

We headed into the mangrove forests, and while clueless non-plant person (me) wandered about enjoying the foliage, mud lobster mounds, scurrying mudskippers and crabs, and sporadic spider-web-in-face experience, the rest went nuts over the mangrove trees that thrived in the cool calm of the Noordin mangroves.

The mangrove forest is quiet and peaceful, lovely rays of light break the shade occasionally, putting some part of nature in the literal spotlight. The forest noise of cicadas, birds and buzzing wasps was punctuated with the occassional crack of plastic bottle marine trash that somebody had to step onto while trudging through the mud. I admired the pretty mangrove plants, my favourite is surely the sea hibiscus.

The brugiera flowers and propagules drew a lot of attention from Ria and Marcus and they got all excited. Read Ria's (more informative than this) post on the fascinating mangrove plants she saw that day.

And I met my namesake in there too:

I took a while admiring these squabbling velvet ants.

Later when we left the mangroves, we got plenty engrossed in trying to photograph these coy fiddler crabs that live right on the shore.

The females were a lot less chicken and let me thrust the lens really close.

I got a serious butt cramp doing all that squatting!! I did more squatting trying to get good pictures of these sand wasps that were all over the periphery of the mangrove forest. Buzzing loudly, occassionally banging heads and busy digging burrows, these pretty blue-striped wasps were completely oblivious to me.

I was very enamoured with these wasps. It could be the hypnotic way their abdomens contract and expand rabidly when they are at rest, as if they were breathing with lungs, or the comical way they dug sand out of their burrows, vigilantly lifting larger objects and transferring them out, dragging the occassional leaf with considerable effort.

Or the way they pose handsomely for pictures!

These digging wasps are predatory, mostly preying on flies, killing them and then storing them in their burrows. The flies are food stores for their developing larvae young that live in the burrows until they mature. Amazing.

Noordin may be cursed with an unsightly shore, what with the ugly fencing just off the coast and shallow beach soggy with a somewhat marine mud substrate that lies just below the top layer of sand, but she boasts a healthy mangrove and thriving shore life. The lack of people there also means its more peaceful to explore. :D

All crabbed out at Tanah Merah

2009-06-07T15:32:00.014+08:00

Oh, clever puns elude me. This morning I joined Ria and friends for a trip to Tanah Merah -- man, I had no idea there was anything there! At 4AM, it was a generous low tide that exposed an expansive intertidal flat bordered by sea wall and rocky substrate.

It was freaking ghost crab central! There were just so many of them scurrying about. And Duck found great amusement in poking them every time one ran across our tracks.

Eye-stalks raised, they look rather hilarious actually.

I did see some fishies, very cute.

This buried guy was rather big, about 6 or 7 inches long. I'm not sure what he is. Could be a dragonet?

Ivan spotted this huge flatworm floundering about among the rocks -- this was about 7 inches long!

Then it turned upside down and swam away, exposing the fragile pink underside!

A feeding gong-gong, nose extended!

There were also many many shrimp. I thought this pic of a buried shrimp is hilarious. Hello, no not quite invisible, you.

A very active shrimp busy digging out his burrow.

This desis spider was skidding about on the surface of the water, in the middle of nowhere!

Duck spotted this tiny nudibranch. Soooo cute.

A bit past 6AM, the tide started coming in. I took a break and admired the haunting full moon. The view at Tanah Merah is lovely.

...and when we got back to our cars we found parking tickets. Boohoo... who the hell checks at 4AM, seriously?

Cat Person

2009-06-05T23:48:00.009+08:00

For a better part of my wee lifetime, I've always considered myself a Dog Person. I think I still am, yes. I miss Socks, my intelligent sheltie doggy who lived with us for all her 13 years. I still bore all my friends with the stories of how she can say grace (she will put her chin on your hand with the treat on it, and only eat it when you say 'Amen'), never letting her leash go taut (she was such a good walker), and plays ball without using her mouth, preferring to kick with her front legs with precision aim (she could even play with more than one human at a time, giving each human a fair turn at the ball).

Last year, we were adopted by a skinny pygmy cat from downstairs -- I was reminded of this post when someone left a comment just yesterday -- I should let everyone know how that's going shouldn't I!

Well, the little bugger didn't come back that often until she became very obviously pregnant -- shit, we all thought. I swear, she was so bony, nobody would have guessed she could bear any sort of viable offspring -- but she did. She had 3 snow-white kittens in the drain downstairs that we discovered purely by accident.

So we left them alone for the time being, providing Cat with food and water at our doorstep. We'd planned to sterilise Cat as soon as her kittens were big enough to loll around without her.

It was something like July, when obscenely heavy rains beat down and we thought Oh Crap. Checking on the kittens, we found Cat under the neighbour's MPV with one white ball in her jaws, and the others missing. Following the flow of water, rain still beating down on us, we found a female kitten at a junction where two drains emptied, four legs spread eagled clinging on to the cement walls. We fished her out, used an umbrella to roll the other kitten out from under the MPV, and took them up to our home. We couldn't find the third kitten.

So Cat and now two kittens lived at our doorstep in a big cardboard box turned onto its side for about two weeks before Cat decided to hitch them back downstairs to the same spot in the drain. Attempts at bringing the family back up were all in vain. Well, shit happened again when a heavy storm struck while the family was on the way to dinner one evening. Luckily we decided to turn back and check on the cats.

It happened again! Cat had the same male in her mouth, mewing desperately, while the other kitten was missing. As I brought the shivering male home to dry off, the parentals took to the drains in search of the female kitten. My father followed the length of the small drain about 50 meters down to the large canal that ran along the main road outside the estate, only to find the female kitten, barely 7 inches long at that time, clinging to the side of the storm drain, water gushing by, one bus stop down from my home!

My father got a large gash on his arm from climbing down that storm drain to fish her out.

The next three months, the kittens lived in our home in a doggy cage that we borrowed from a cat-carer we befriended. Cat was allowed daily visits of course, and later on, we sent her to be sterilised. When the kittens reach 4 months, they were sent for sterilisation too.

The white kittens turned colour -- the male remained white but with pale brown colouration on his ears, nose and tail, while the female developed grey stripe markings on her face, legs and tail, with dark grey ears. The male was very dim, and looked like a monkey. So we named him Monkey.

Monkey and Dirty at 4 weeks, trying to eat Cat's food.

Before the female turned colour, her nose developed a dirty splotch of black. So we called her Dirty Face.

That's the splotch that appeared something like 2 weeks.

Meet Dirty and Monkey at 3 months old:

...drinking out of the toilet bowl.

Dirty was very obviously the smarter one. And given her survival record, we decided she must be the fighter between the two, and that mummy Cat had to save Monkey both times because she must have known that he was dim.

So we had a lovely arrangement -- The Cats would hang out outside at night, and hang out inside in the day. And for a few months, this worked out fine. Until Monkey went missing.

Something must have happened, because ever since, Dirty never ventured out again, insisting on living as a fulltime housecat. This was very strange because she was always the restless one, hunting and exploring all night. One night she did spend the night outside, she returned with a wound on her back that developed into an abcess -- we had to take her to the vet to remedy that, the poor thing.

Cat was still nervous around us, even though we took care of her all this while, so she stayed outside. Returning to talk to Dirty at night, and at feeding time.

Just last month, she too, disappeared.

We don't know if people took her, and we can't explain that, given that she had a clipped ear.

So it's now just us and Dirty.

Haha, she looks so silly. She tweets, by the way! See how often she sleeps at twitter.com/dirty_face

Colugo at MacRitchie

2009-06-02T15:32:00.007+08:00

Recently, the goat and I ventured to MacRitchie reservoir to conquer the tree tops -- we got more than we expected: 1. We got lost = extra mileage that made up about 10KM. and 2. We saw a fat Colugo! Coochiicoochiikoo kind of Colugo.

It was just when we were making our arduous descent from the tree top walk having been through the trail-with-no-end, and paused as we approached a small group of ang mohs, discreet in demeanor save for the large jungle hats they donned and the even larger cameras they handled.

I squealed quietly (it is possible) as I spotted their furry find: a red Colugo! My few previous encounters with Colugos were all of the grey variety so this was particularly fascinating! Also, this fella was so low to the ground and near the trail that we very easily crept up to about 2 metres away to take its picture. It was so close, I was reminded of that incident some years back where some local pranksters practically murdered a mother and baby Colugo pair with a slingshot.

Trust our locals to ignore certain natural wonder as a few parties of noisy families and teenagers trudged past our motley crew of oh, about 6 or 7 of us, completely oblivious to the furry treehugger.

We later found out that the bunch of ang mohs were visiting from Australia and one of them was a professional nature videographer. How nice.

We made our way out to civilisation, sweaty, utterly exhausted and parched from the noon sun, when the ang mohs proudly announced that their next stop was Bukit Timah Hill. We were very impressed, given the heat. They were only in town for a few days, they said. Pity, we were going to offer to take them to Ubin that weekend.

That's me faint from the noon sun. Funny huh? It wasn't very funny at the time though :X

Tomato man, Luxor, Egypt

2008-07-22T01:11:00.004+08:00

As we passed tomato fields over Luxor's Nile banks, jolly farmers waved warmly, at some point greeting us with attempts at giving us a few fat fruits as gifts, lopping them towards the balloon. We swooped low but unfortunately, not low enough. We could see the Valley of the Kings in the distance, and rose so high that any sense of vertigo was lost. The patchwork farmland was dotted with fluffy white sheep, farmhands and children chased the balloon's shadow, donkeys in tow. The green boundaries of the Nile banks ended abruptly where desert began. Egypt is beautiful.

Alexandria, Egypt

2008-06-01T11:31:00.005+08:00

Merchant selling poached sea creatures (site of the Lighthouse at Alexandria in background) -- including numerous cowries, sea stars, conchs, hard corals, red sponges, small sharks and a turtle shell. More photos of Alexandria here.

Alexander the Great, forever immortalized in the city of Alexandria, founded Egypt's major port that served as her capital for thousands of years. Famous for her ancient lighthouse -- one of the ancient wonders of the world, prolific with tales of the gargantuan beacon guiding many a wary traveller in ancient times -- Alexandria's picturesque Mediterranean coastline and city center is sprawling with Greek and Roman architecture.

A castle is now built atop the ruins of the ancient lighthouse, now turned obligate tourist destination. Many merchants display their wares, flanking the path leading up to the castle. Alexandria's vibrant street life, lovely Mediterranean weather and beautiful cityscape make her my favourite city in Egypt.

Luxor, Egypt.

2008-05-12T23:26:00.002+08:00

The Collosi of Memnon, March 2008. More photos of Luxor.

Whine.

2008-05-07T21:03:00.006+08:00

Good people are running about the intertidals these few days at lovely pre-dawn low tides while I'm sulking at home rushing work. WHY.

It seems that everything keeps coming at me at the same bloody time -- Which, I'm sure, will lead into a lovely lull period some time in the future where there'll be almost nothing to do, and days are passed in sweet leisure, where the vital decision du jour would be "what shall I have for breakfast and which comic should I read first?".

Whatever happened to my idea of bringing the pet snail to work? I must give it a good rethink, I do have a glass tank that could look mighty fine on the desk.

Bluetooth bunny above aptly illustrates my current obsession at work. (= Idea-wow-revelation-oh-SHIT-now-what-do-I-do?!) But I wonder if anything will materialise from this, so let's see how it goes.

ps - the tablet is back!

Cyrene

2008-04-29T09:49:00.017+08:00

Last Friday we headed out on our pre-dawn expedition to Cyrene reef with Dr Lane, echinoderm expert, on a modest Dolphin boat with an accompanying Baby Dolphin dinghy we needed for our amphibious landing.

Cyrene reef is situated west of Labrador beach, right smack in between Jurong Island and Pulau Bukom -- a busy shipping lane with very choppy waters.

Setting out from the Singapore Yacht Club, I could barely keep my eyes open as we geared up. I was extremely sleepy, but thoroughly excited because it's not easy to go to this elusive reef. Few boatmen want to take you there and it is only revealed at suitable low tides. Cyrene is a must-visit, given her rumoured notoriety of being one of the most sea-star abundant intertidals in Singapore.

The last time the wild crew were there, MPA paid a visit with embarassing loud-hailer hospitality. There is always some explaining to do and it really helps that the NParks folks are around with us.

As we took turns to climb off the boat onto the dinghy and subsequently splosh unceremoniously into hip-high water on the sand banks of Cyrene, instructions on what to look out for were called out. We were on the quest for an evil-looking sea star, Pentaceraster -- which, predictably (just like previous trips with Dr Daphne for those stupid Condylactus 'nems), eluded us up til the last few minutes (tide's coming in!! HELLO?!), and that, according to Dr Lane, made this visit entirely worth the effort.

I'd never seen so many freakin' knobbly sea stars in one place in my life! My lousy bunny eyes seldom spot me any exciting knobs but that morning was like... freakin' knobbly pallooza. It wasn't just the abundance of knobblies that got me excited but that there were also sooo many anemone shrimp out and about, almost entirely oblivious to my fingering their anemone hosts. Kok Sheng also spotted a queer lil pencil urchin and funny sea hares.

I felt up a few sea hares myself and gave hand jobs to some naughty-lookin' knobblies (the Duck finds that a turn-on...) I'm kidding of course. Thanks to Marcus for the photos :)

We've been adopted

2008-04-05T21:06:00.004+08:00

We've been adopted by a gray-brown mottled tabby I've affectionately been calling "my pygmy cat from downstairs" because she is so small and she lives downstairs. Recently she's been skulking around my doorstep after months of bounding across my feet walking me home when I come home late at night.

We only started feeding her when we spied a large gaping wound at her tailbone area and attempted to help her recover by feeding her well. I figure she must be hiding from what/whoever inflicted that large wound on her. She unfortunately would not allow herself to be human-handled when we tried to treat the wound.

It's been a week and the wound is finally scabby. She's now warmed up to us and her virgin purring session was seriously intense! She loves her kibble and bit of string but isn't allowed into the house -- yet (she's attempted to stary inside many times when we weren't looking). We'll see how this goes.

Back from the land of the pharoahs

2008-03-23T21:33:00.005+08:00

Check it out!!! It's the freakin' end of March and I haven't visited blogger for ages. It's almost like I've become so lazy that I've neglected my cyber enclave for the sluggish alternative that is Facebook, only to realise now that so many of my imageshack photos are gone. Well, we'll fix that up some other time.

Meanwhile, the new year has come and gone, major events at work at a stand-still due to red-bloody-tape, and I've been to Egypt and back, all in a month and a half.

The state of my spanking new (once yellow) sneakers is testament to the dusty adventure I've been on in the desert wildnerness that is Egypt. That is to say, that dust, desert sand and ash from the permanent haze there really took a toll on my clothes and lungs.

But it was a lovely holiday with family and friends, and I've made so many new acquaintances that are just a joy to have around on vacation.

Egypt, in spite of her lovely polluted air, is gorgeous. And once acclimatised to the endless harrassment from local merchants, and getting used to being marginalised because of one's gender, it is a pleasant experience. Luckily, Cairo was progressive enough that women were evidently more empowered than the less cosmopolitan areas like Luxor and Aswan.

So I'm back from the trip visibly unharmed, but thoroughly satisfied with the adventure.

This trip, I was threatened by merchants twice for attempting to bargain (this happened in the more ulu areas of the country), molested by a meek looking young man (but I made sure he was properly ashamed before making a run for it), got suitably dust-coated in the Valley of the Kings when I decided not to wear long pants, cooked from the outside in Aswan as temperatures soared to 34 degrees, and chilled in windy Cairo and Alexandria where the weather turned out to be a comfortable 18 to 24 degrees.

We took a hot air balloon over the West Bank of Luxor, strolled through Karnak at night when the atmosphere was one of awe and reverance, settled down on the Nile as we cruised for 4 days south toward Aswan.

We circled the Aswan high dam in searing heat, and joined a pre-dawn convoy to Abu Simbel, my favourite place in Egypt, where the famous Temple of Ramses II appeared behind a hill overlooking Lake Nasser, and the monstrous statues of the ancient Pharoah's likeness simply took my breath away.

Later, I braved a personal record of not taking a shower in 53 hours, during which we boarded an overnight train to Cairo. There, the formidable Pyramids greeted us in an anti-climatic rising from behind the hazy cityscape, where tarred roads led up to the Pyramids and between them. The beauty of neighbouring Alexandria and its gorgeous coastline made the 3-hour drive from Giza city worth it.

I don't know how to describe the feeling of having touched 3000-year-old monuments upon which the foundation of a mighty empire rested.

Coming back from it all, reality is hard to stomach. I've learnt to embrace a new language - Arabic, and it is really beautiful. I've lost my immunity to chilli, evident in my stomach's poor response to local food the week since I've returned. I've made a new friend, my Egyptian guide, whose passion for his country's ancient history is truly admirable, and whom I've learnt so much from.

East Coast Re-run

2008-01-29T23:47:00.000+08:00

Sometime last year during one of the early evening low tides I had my first chance encounter on a precious spread of sand flat that harboured the largest population of sand dollars I'd ever seen. YC and I flung our bikes onto the sand as we bounced off to check out a large sand flat exposed in a rare low tide that exposed East Coast this much.

A few weeks later, I popped by again after a run and scheduled to meet the fraternal unit there to show him around that stretch. Did I mention he is useful for a shiny new DSLR?

As we waded into the shallow waters, a first surprise was 2 huge mud crabs sitting at the edge of the opening of a large canal. The brother, always unwilling to get his hands dirty, egged me on to poke the buggers, because we were convinced they were dead. Well it turns out they were indeed rather lifeless. Who released these guys, we'll never know.

I took him along the sand bar where I found the massive populations of button snails and we encountered a funny little boy who was curious about a sand star I'd found. He asked many questions about how it "walks" and I explained to him about how the sea star moves and burrows. Later, we spied a fisherman with his hyperactive jack russell terrier bounding around on the sand, getting suitably muddy and wet.

I went further down the beach to check on the carpet anemone I found on my earlier trip and it was still there, looking like it was ready to be entirely buried in sediment. It's interesting, there weren't any other carpet anemones in the entire stretch.

As we headed back to the tide gently coming in, we saw another dead mud crab about the same size along the shore adjacent to the canal.

Dog-watching

2008-01-20T21:07:00.000+08:00

Woops. I was stuck in the twilight that is the Penultimate Fantasy IIIVVV whatever in Boozember 2007 that I forgot it is now 2008. What the hell?

So Christmas is over and New Year has also come and gone, oops, sorry I missed it all. It seems like just yesterday it was Christmas day and we were toasting on algae and mud.

Having missed much of the new year since somehow it's 2008 and CNY is just around the corner, the blog has been sorely neglected for the lesser entity that is Facebook. Lesser -- because this site looks so much more awesome. Yay. (It's just easier to post things there and now that I've procrastinated for months on installing photoshop here, Facebook is not only the blog-roll, photo posts and commentary substitute, it is also a great way to loaf at work.)

I went down to the dog show at Expo this morning for my shift at the SPCA booth and brought along my trusty camera because you know, you get all kinds of strange sightings at these things. You get the total freak shows and the totally gorgeous animals (and sometimes totally gorgeous guys who train these clever animals).

Performing the "Stay" and "down" command during the obedience trials. See the lazy husky in the bottom right corner? So funny.

Later, the agility/obstacle courses were very impressive, but it all happens too quickly for a good shot with my humble point-and-shoot.

Like I said; beautiful animals:

Total freak shows:

What the hell?

Ok, the grey hound I can understand, he gets cold, and the air-conditioning in the hall was pretty nasty. But the fur... I could do without. There were many other freaks but I'd leave that to Facebook.

The highlight of the day was probably dog-watching outside after my shift when I shot some paparazzi shots of funny people and their funny dogs.

What a neat way to keep those pesky cocker spaniel ears out of the way!! And very fashionable too I must say. This pair came with a huge retriever that also wore this... head band thingie.

Silly little mop of a dog. Must be a crazy bitch to brush.

Funny tiny dogs meet. Silly dress on a silly dog. Dog owners never fail to amaze.

Big fluffy samoyed spies a curious tri-colour corgi. So cute. Another volunteer at the stall brought his corgi along with him and she was so fat and short, her belly was an inch away from the floor. zomg!

Christmas on Chek Jawa

2007-12-27T23:42:00.000+08:00

I find myself loafing off at work playing with Photoshop 9 because I so badly miss that frakkin software on my own laptop. @#!@#$.

Is there a support group for post-Christmas-feasting depression? I think I could use some erh, assurance, support, flab-empowerment and what have you right now.

Christmas day was spent helping Kok Sheng on his CJ project checking in on the animals he's been monitoring. He was particularly worried this month due to new reports of floods in Johor, which was what originally caused the mass deaths on Chek Jawa due to a massive drop in salinity.

Working on the peacock anemones he assigned me to the last time, I had 3 other teammates to help slug it out on the mud this time, and to keep my blurness in check as I spaced out a couple of times over the 10m quadrats. We had a good leisurely time because the low tide was rather long and we'd set up the quadrat markers the last trip.

Kok Sheng patiently orientated me as the tide went out and helped me find the markers we set in previously. Sounds easier than it really is especially for a blur bunny like me. Once we locate a quadrat, we had to mark out the original 10m square using 2 PVC poles, a hammer, 40m rope and a GPS map. Then, we proceed to locate all peacocks in the quadrat and measure them individually.

Ria caught us goofing off over a peacock anemone.

Eve eve on Sunday was spent doing monitoring along east-west transects on Chek Jawa as well. That was also good fun but tiring as hell especially along the 500m transect line OMG.

But my team was awesome. Yay. Kok Sheng has a wonderful post of the animals we saw and the humans struggling over the mud.

I can't wait to get photos from YC of the cute things we saw that day: this huge-ass volute, the tiniest sea star I've ever seen (smaller than the width of my finger and I have small fingers!), a tiny bivalve that looked like a razor struggling on the surface of the mud looking for a place to dig into, some cute lil swimming 'nems and a small, funny orange-spotted crab.

The highlight of the day could possibly be having champagne on the intertidal to celebrate Christmas, New Year, and the last lowish low tide of the year. Bubbly is always good to me! And having it on gorgeous Chek Jawa is probably a poignant statement in itself. A first for me and somewhat surreal, toasting on the intertidal has been a tradition for the past 6 years.

Have a good lazy New Year and please everyone get fat with me.

A bunny's (second) life

2007-12-10T00:08:00.000+08:00

Because I haven't installed Photoshop on this machine (which is why I'm grumpy and have not been updating) I attempted to make a collage of some second life snapshots on Power-effing-point 2007, which has a weird user interface by the way. Because also, these snapshots are of good quality they didn't need editing. I wish I could say the same for my photos of my first life, of which I've neglected to post bad photos of 3 huge but very dead mud crabs I prodded at East Coast 2 Sundays ago at low tide.

So having completed Puzzle Pirates in less than a day, and having the other game I loaned turn out to be broken (!!), staying in on this wet cold Sunday only means to finally get down to exploring second life once and for all, since I'm going to need it for work very soon.

The Singaporean community on second life is small but very friendly, and their domain on second life, otherwise known as Kaki Isles, is so well done-up I spent the entire afternoon exploring and interacting the objects and spaces there. Some kind regulars took me around and showed me some cool hide-outs, while my second visit saw me invited to a small informal gathering of sorts, as you can tell from the snapshot at the bottom -- a motley crew indeed.

In defense of the underdogs

2007-12-02T20:41:00.001+08:00

Today's news on page 3 is very unashamedly a strange article titled "Has Singapore Gone to the Dogs?" which honestly had no actual point to it, and I failed to see it if there were. In fact, I may go as far as saying that the article was run so that some journos could use a cheesy headline.

"They splash around unleashed at beaches" and who are they bothering? A couple of interviewees said that they are scared of dogs and are afraid that unleashed dogs will come up to them and sniff them.

Some say allowing dogs to sit on chairs is unhygeinic. Others are just uncomfortable with dogs hanging around eating places, albeit al fresco.

Once again, bizarre arguments are supported by these strange unfounded claims. Sure, one dog attacked a child recently, and cumulated statistics against pets come up to set the foundation to these claims.

Look;

Singapore is not a third world country -- animals don't always harbour disease and pestilence, they don't serve as vectors of disease except in rare cases of say, mange (which are mostly dog-specific anyway). Truth is, no disease (if any) spread by domestic pets (or even strays) pose any problem in our country. Even rabies is almost unheard of.

I mean, have you even sat next to a whole team of soccer bengs fresh from the field on a bus? These guys are dirtier than 10 smelly dogs combined. With bonus sweat. Times 100. Add +50 inconsideration and 100 bacteria points.

I have the answer. Humans -- we spread disease like nobody's business. Seriously, we should ban humans from public places.

Animals have control over their bladders and rectums just like us.

In fact, I dare say they have more control than a 2 year old. Just because a dog is a dog is a dog in a cafe, does not mean that the dog will just urinate or poop whenever it can. Please, dogs need some downtime from defaecation and excretion like the rest of us humans. People just think they are like, shit machines or something.

Some people are uncomfortable seeing dogs unleashed in the vicinity. Hell, I'm uncomfortable seeing babies unleashed in my immediate 10 metre radius and I'm not complaining. Do babies have rights? Sure. Do I have the right to feel comfortable? Yes, but I'm not expecting anyone to bend over backwards just because I'm uncomfortable. Because I respect the parents of the thing, and its rights, and most of all, I accept that I'm not the Center of the Universe. Certainly, if your baby is violent and loud and annoying, you shouldn't be taking it out to the park to terrorise members of the public? Similarly if your dog is badly behaved and vicious, you shouldn't let him loose unleashed.

If anything, I have faith in that most dog owners are responsible this way. I've seen dogs dining with their families al fresco, and usually in the corners away from people. Surely there are sore thumbs, and these people give dog owners a bad name.

But then I blame the citizenry whom, from isolated exceptional cases, establish the premise that all dogs are therefore, dangerous, dirty and just, well, scary. It's become almost like a witch hunt not unlike those centuries ago, where one would hear the refrain of "stone them all!" reverberate in the air.

And it just saddens me further that the authorities plainly set laws to placate the noise-makers, instead of attempting to reason or engage everyone else in these issues.

We whine about being paternalistic, a nanny state; but isn't it these noise-makers that almost always ask to be nannied? "Will the authorities do something about this and that..." etc.

When will we see the day where a forum letter says "Hey we all need to start doing this and this to help make things better" without the tune of a nannying request?

Vista is pretty

2007-11-18T19:11:00.000+08:00

But omg I hope you support my version of Photoshop, among other software, and my vast library of mp3s that hail from dubious origins.

Having shut down on me for the first time, I dug out my recovery discs in my diy effort to reawaken the laptop, only to grab the (ublabelled) vista recovery discs, instead of my XP that was separate since I purchased it as a downgrade from sucky vista.

But nevermind, I will see how this goes.

Now I'm awkardly bobbing around this strange new platform, this odd OS that can't decide if it wants to be a mac or PC. But intuitively, thank goodness, things are still where they usually are. Windows open with this floating, dissolving finnesse. They close equally gracefully. Startup sounds are very flighty feminine, and alert sounds are just as subtle. Mouse over icons yield a gentle pop up preview. This is almost like owning a brand new machine.

Having spent an entire day in resigned sluggishness, mostly from my 4-hour shift at the AVA roadshow yesterday, but also mourning the loss of my many pictures, including holidays in Bintan, Krabi, and animals spotted on field trips and dog shows, I have earned myself a great big headache.

I gaze at this sleek, black machine in disdain, wondering how she managed to fail me in between episodes of Battlestar Galactica, while I fooled around with the iLike application on Facebook.

I've mourned enough, I figure, I'll just have to pick up the inventory again. I'm installing Call of Cthulhu as a christening present for this new old machine. (The library has an awesome collection of games.)

And then after that, I'm settling in on episode 3 of season 3 of BSG. Sadly, Lee Adama is fat now, and the soundtrack also sucks in this season.

Surprises at East Coast

2007-11-11T22:29:00.000+08:00

I love Sundays mostly because I can do whatever the hell I want.

Yesterday while we sped along the coast on our bicycles we spotted this extensive shallow sand flat exposed due to the afternoon low tide. Dumping our wheels on the sand, we skipped in to explore, only to mentally smack ourselves silly for neglecting to bring our cameras. The entire place is bloody sand dollar central! This less explored part of ECP heralded a pleasant surprise, as prior visits to the intertidals along ECP were markedly disappointing (but still alive with low diversity) and one time -- gruesome.

Today I scooted down there at low tide, this time armed with the camera, to nudge the critters and check out the awesome sunset. Sand dollars were out in full force, their marks in the sand easily mistaken for doggy paw prints. But under the water, partially exposed sand dollars made for a pretty, starry sight.

Pity that the tide wasn't low enough to explore the extensive sand flats. What little was explored showed low diversity, but massive numbers of sand dollars amazed me, and a few amusing critters were out in the daylight. One interesting find was this lone carpet anemone that looked like it was being smothered with sand each time the waves came in. There must be more further out but I couldn't spot any other along the entire flat that was explosed. Special 'nem indeed. I tried taking photos of a 'nem I suspect is the Bob Blob, but failed miserably.

A shy but sluggish moon crab mooned me several times and in my attempt to finger him, I realised that he(she?)'d just moulted. Better hide you from the nearby kids going crazy over button shells. We spotted some moon snails on the move yesterday but they were no where to be seen today. I also saw some tiny solefish that moved too quickly for me to capture on film.

My growling tummy and the rising tide told me it was time to scoot home for dinner. And looking up from the water, I took some quick photos of the gorgeous sunset before leaving.

Bintanpalooza

2007-11-05T00:37:00.000+08:00

Way overdue. Backlogs unleashed!
*warning: bimbo post.

Too Much Drama

2007-11-04T18:26:00.000+08:00

3 words: too much drama.

I got home from duty at the dog show this morning to be greeted with news that we are interim foster family to this fella:

Meet Rabbit the husky (I kid you not) getting washed up on the balcony.

A suspected victim of abuse (who lived in a tiny HDB!) and of skittish nature, Rabbit looks more like a pure-bred mongrel than husky. Kind of like this happy fella we met on the way back from the park yesterday:

But anyway.

We couldn't bring ourselves to call him "Rabbit" so he has been affectionately referred to as "Dog" for the time being. Apparently, his unfortunate name was attributed to his uncanny resemblance to a rabbit when he was a wee pup. Like, W.T.F.

Mum yelled at him just now about pulling up plants, "NO, RABBIT, NO!" and you could just imagine the hilarity of it all; we were in fits of laughter for a good 2 minutes.

Labeeeet.

I hope he survives this foster period, unlike poor Lucky who died a few months back while I was trying to re-home him. Yeah, I know irony.

SPCA World Animal Day: Adventure at ECP

2007-10-07T17:36:00.000+08:00

The carnival started out warm, sunny, friendly and verily furry as happy people trotted in all-smiles with their furry friends. We all had such a good time chatting with everyone who came by to say hi. By noon, I was absolutely exhausted. The duck dropped by with his massive camera as usual but that's great cos he took many furry pictures!

At ca. 1:15pm, a line of park-goers formed along the shoreline and I was wondering hey wth? Only to realise that they were all gazing in awe at the most massive mother of a water spout I've ever seen in my life. People were excitedly taking photos, posing, pointing and grinning like idiots, conveniently ignoring the dark sky looming above.

Oh.... it looks beautiful in the pictures, but 5 minutes after everyone admired the large spout, a gale hit our tentage with such force it took so much of our stock with it past marine cove and into the carpark some 30m away.

The spout had actually hit the shoreline. As with all waterspouts, I expected it to die off as it approached the shore. But inspite of passing through the shallow intertidal, it spun past the breakwater and onto land. As it grounded just about 10 meters away from us, we could see clearly the swirl of salt spray as it hit the beach hut pub with patrons desperately scooting to the inside.

The wind blew 3 of the tent's legs off the ground and required like 10 people to hold each down!

Amidst the carnage, volunteers desperately tried to salvage our loot and move all our bulky stuff into the center of the tent. Selina called for the generator to be shut off in case people came into contact with the power units by accident.

People holding up the tent legs decided it was no use, and yelled for everyone to run out. Civil defence was called.

As we evacuated the tent into the heavy rain, we nearly fell from the strength of the gale. Standing under the meagre shelter of the Beach Hut pub of marine cove, we watched in silent prayer that the tentage would not be blown off. What if the pieces hit the restaurants and carpark?

The rain soon reduced to a drizzle and volunteers scooted back to view the wreckage. Things were soaked and blown across the entire area. We salvaged what we could and tried to ignore our soaked clothes and shoes.

Not to be called a wash-out in tomorrow's newspapers, organisers quickly decided to re-set the event to carry on for the rest of the afternoon.

As we took in the damage at ground zero, people quickly picked up the pace. Sort out what's wet, what's dry, what's too wrecked to be used, what should go into the garbage. How shall we waterproof our table since it's soaked through? It certainly was inspiring to see everyone in their washed-out appearances quickly working together. Our spirits were far from dampened.

What an adventure indeed. No sooner had we returned to the site to re-setup, did numbers of pet owners trail in to check out the water-soaked carnival. In between trying to set up the tables, we had to entertain enthusiastic members of the public. We seriously could not figure out where they'd all appeared from when just a second ago, the rain was so thick you could barely see 20 meters ahead.

Dogsitting

2007-10-04T22:42:00.000+08:00

There's simply so much to do these days. When I'm not at work, I rather spend my free time with the family and friends, doing meaningful things like go on a beachfleas trip and paint my nails; I mean, other than blogging.

In between the work piling up (but it's enjoyable, creative work so that's ok), cyber-loafing, having long, decadent lunches, and thinking about how many things I've been meaning to blog about (there is Krabi part 3, Bintan-paloooza, field trip to Changi beach, among other things), I have been dog-sitting.

Well, I don't mean to take much credit since the folks have been coddling the fur-ball most of the time, but this one sure is a handful. And not because she is messy and gross, but because she is needy as hell.

She is what I'd call, simply put, a lap-dog. No, not those you find in Lapland. The kind you find perched atop the nearest lap, soaking in the tickles and pats and coo-coo's like an SPG soaks in the sun topless while on a crowded beach -- I mean to say, loving the attention.

I give you Girl. She goes by no other (I knew a dog once, his name was Come Here). She is a pure white schnauzer.

This stupid dog (I mean that so damned affectionately you can so tell I'm sure.) has never gone for a walk outside her home, has a set of shoes to wear for goodness knows what occasion, and does not know how to climb stairs. Unfortunately for us, she attempted to on the second night of her stay, only to freak out 4 steps up because she didn't dare venture up, or down.

After trimming the hair off her paws (it was like trying to slide around on friggin' pom poms on a marble floor is how bad it was) and clipping her nails, and one night of coaching (yelp-filled I assure you), she managed to make it up unassisted tonight. We only do this because Girl is needy as hell and requires company as she sleeps.

She also neatly blends in with the marble floor of the living room which makes her hard to spot. That and her small size (about the size of 2 jack russell terriers) resulted in a number of near-tramplings on her furry behind.

We still haven't figured out if she understands English or Mandarin as details about her original home are sketchy. We also doubt her intelligence (though there is something there looking back as we gaze into her eyes) since she is severely lacking in any external stimuli like, say, other dogs, more than 3 humans at a time, and smells of the road, grass, other dogs, and well, everything else other than food and her home. And she has a silly name.

I think the girl is collecting her tomorrow and that would mark the end of our little 4-day dog-sitting adventure. The folks definitely enjoyed it, I can tell.

And I think I admit I'll miss this furry one when she leaves. I remember what it's like to have a dog again and after this whole year without one, Girl's presence is bittersweet; though I'm sure Socks would be forgiving if she knew I said it was more sweet than bitter.

The Misery of the Human Condition

2007-09-23T13:00:00.000+08:00

A few days ago, my first cousin gave birth to a pink, wrinkled, hairless thing the paternal unit refers to as "quite a pretty baby".

I didn't visit yesterday but am secretly glad I skipped it, partly because a day out cycling at east coast held 10 times more appeal, but mostly because babies make me nervous and skipping the visit meant avoiding bickering relations whose idea of a battle-of-wits is arguing over whichcarparkismoreaccessible and waityouarelostnoiamnot.

The bane of my restlessness is that the mind goes into overdrive, and depression sets in over such mundane worries as how everything could be different if we could turn back time. Would I have done many things differently? Made harsher decisions? Stayed strong and independent when I had to? Kept the ones who meant so much closer than I actually did?

I walked the neighbourhood market this morning and an old couple hobbled past. The man looked healthy; greying but stout and healthy looking. His wife's limbs were deformed and she walked with great difficulty.

I think about how our minds have so much capacity for growth, for thought, for consciousness; yet we are trapped in this shell, limited to what our physiology allows.

Although most of our limitations that ground us are stemmed from our lack of nerve.

I think about the little wrinkled hamster my cousin just produced, and wonder what it he must be thinking. Can he even be thinking very much? Possibilities must be limitless.

As I grew up, a world of opportunity greeted me. The more I learnt, the more ambitious I became.

Later in life, I looked forward with caution. And as I cast my eyes toward the horizon, I see possibilities -- closing before me unceremoniously.

I think of how my body will fail me; my mind, fighting a losing battle with my broken machinery, trapped in an ailing shell, only to be comforted by the constant administration of drugs that will only slow the inevitable regression.

Kayaking in Krabi (part 2)

2007-09-16T23:19:00.000+08:00

I knew we had to do this when I researched on what to do in Krabi. A tour that cost us 550baht each (~SGD25) was booked in town at the agent that took us to phi phi, and included a pick up from our hotel lobby, transport out of town through the outskirts that looked much like Boleh Land but nicer, and 2 experienced guides. As the pickup made its way through small dirt roads we admired the looming limestone cliffs and giggled at the silly Irishmen so desperately slathering on copius amounts of sunblock.

We stopped at a modest hut that led to the mangroves. After packing our crap into waterproof bags, we promptly set out to drag our kayaks into the water and hopped right in. Paddling out against the current toward the bay, the misty waters simply... took our breath away. The halfway across the choppy waters, we realised we didn't have lifejackets on :0000

Slugging it out across the bay, we then skirted the opposite limestone cliff. When we finally approached the river mouth, we took a rest from the paddling and let the tide take us in. Steep cliffs flanked either side and climbing vegetation, including some gorgeous palms, slithered up the rock face. We reminisced King Kong and proceeded to scoff at how impossible it must have been for the blonde to run barefoot on this kind of substrate AND still look ravishing.

The stillness of the canyons was unsettling yet overwhelmingly serene. As we took it all in in silence, Dave mumbled something about Apocalypse Now, and then we said no not really this is more like Anaconda. In the stillness, we stopped for a break, and the boys took a smoke, while I lay down on my back, still reeling from the surreality of it all.

And then it rained. Our guide took out a large knife and chopped up a plump pineapple for everyone. "Leave the skin on your kayak for the monkeys" He said.

Monkeys?!

We paddled into the mangroves, dominated by rhizophora, so we had to negotiate delicately between all the prop roots, colliding with the trees every now and then. I nearly freaked at what seemed like the ventral view of a large ass spider going up a trunk right in front of my face, only to collect myself when I figured it must be a tree-climbing crab.

As we made a sharp corner past a cliff and thick mangroves on the other side, loud shrieks greeted us and only too quickly, a very soaked monkey (it was raining) hopped in front of me and grabbed the pineapple skins off my kayak. One, two, three, more and more OMG I squealed pleasedon'tstealmycamera as one sat next to me when I ran out of fruit, and proceeded to rest her arms on mine looking imploringly into my eyes. She had a baby holding on to her!

When the monkeys decided that we were out of candy, they scooted up the cliff and half watched us paddle forward, half savouring their spoils of the morning. Not so crab-eating macaques eh?

We followed the river through as it made a nice loop in the cliffs before we emerged to the same bay we crossed earlier. A full 3 hours later, we made it back to the kayak hut, thoroughly soaked, shagged out, and still gushing from the adventure.

Why Krabi needs little commentary (part 1)

2007-09-16T13:40:00.001+08:00

Because photos can tell all. I'm not sure how to even paint a more accurate picture of the beautiful scenery off the coast of Krabi we admired in awe as we slugged it out on a kayak across a choppy bay into serene estuaries that snake through mangroves and steep canyons, or the breath-taking view of phi phi island and its nearby sisters glowing in the sunlight, or the stunning clear waters so notorious for its snorkelling and diving experiences.

Because cheap transport on Krabi to the dive/snorkel/kayak spots is negligible, we had to spend on hiring guides and transportation to and from the outskirts of Ao Nang town. But in the end, it's all worth it. Krabi still has an old charm to it not yet entirely bastardised by tourism. Thais are friendly as usual. Even though we arrived in Krabi to a tsunami warning and numerous aftershocks from the Indonesia earthquakes, we shook off the nerves and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. The only complaint: too short a holiday (and some rain :[). No time to laze on the beach.

But it's too easy to get there. With daily flights to Krabi on Tiger Airways (which is cheap, comfy, and has pretty stewardesses!) and cheap accomodation, there is hardly any excuse to miss this quick holiday destination.

I miss my days of leisure already.

Chinatown in mid autumn

2007-09-11T22:42:00.000+08:00

I always wanted to see what this whole tooth relic thing was about, and stepped into the tooth relic temple in Chinatown this evening to be surprised (because I am suaku) to be greeted by a blast of air-conditioned air. The bunny was also surprised by other strange things, like how the entire perimeter was lined with larger-than-life animals of the zodiac, and how the entire interior was decked in gold and red wood, "saturating" the atmosphere to the extreme irritation of my retina. I also didn't find the said tooth in the end.

I'll be back on Saturday night, hopefully, refreshed, thoroughly guilty and suitably raring to embark on a new phase in life. Realistically though, I know I will be a jittery bundle of nerves about Monday.

Greenies in the news!

2007-09-10T17:59:00.000+08:00

The greenie article was finally printed today, possibly my last too :( See it on wildsg.

I want to thank everyone whom I spoke with; inspiration came from all of you even if you weren't quoted. Thanks Kok Sheng (I'm sorry they cropped your photo and we can't see much of Chek Jawa in the end >:-[ ), Ron, Siva, Ria, Marcus and YC for your input and encouragement, and Kelvin for your kind patience. Most importantly, I hope I made a difference with this piece.

Ria posted up some nice photos to go with the piece :D

A day at the Nee Soon Freshwater Reserve (and many spiders)

2007-09-08T23:46:00.000+08:00

Bright and early yesterday was spent at a less familiar part of the island also known as the general-blurry-central/north-area thankfully, with a duck as guide. Also, a bunny without a camera means she steals from his flickr too. Thanks for all the pics!

Walking through the muddy waterlogged reserve of Nee Soon, north of Lower Peirce and east of Seletar reservoir, you can easily admire the many wild freshwater fish that thrive in the acidic shallow waters, critters that dart over the water surface, numerous wolf spiders nervously racing across your path, friendly butterflies that flit among the shrubs and water plants sluggishly, and lazy orb weavers in languid loathing (I'm sure) of the many ugly harvestmen that loiter around their webs, probably being annoying and kleptoparasitic.

Thankfully, the weather remained sunny as long as we still had the energy to carry on. Because I like spiders more than anything else I saw, here's a closer look at the spider highlights of the day. All photos by the duck.

Nipping it in the bud

2007-09-04T22:06:00.001+08:00

Unlike many who revel in their memories of the past, I like to live in the present and in so doing, feel shitty about it. But that's alright. 'Cos at least I have a better idea of how to get things moving forward, you know, instead of staying in one place and let everyone else take over while I grow fungus.

Taking the occasional tumble in a small puddle of the past tense is perfectly fine. When the puddle is deep however, you may find yourself sinking, plop, rather quickly, more like, unintentional diving, kind of like how Criss Angel does it in mind freak, disappearing into oblivion to the horror of the flabbergasted audience that drown out their surprised gasps with loud speculation of how indeed was that trick done?

But unlike Criss Angel (who is frighteningly, mind-blowingly hot, if I may say so) who appears by some freak of really cool lighting effects or psychological meltdown, resurfaces from some other puddle say 10 feet away, most people who take the occasional tumble down memory puddle so to speak, and sink quickly, they rarely if ever, come out of it do they?

It sure sucks spiky balls to be surrounded by people who have brains like fucking dalmations, or like that elephant in India that never forgets people and their misdoings in the past and learnt to express his emotions or implicate a wrong-doer with accusations emblazoned across a canvas, delicately so, with a slight flick of his trunk, sniffles, and drops the paintbrush in a heave of emotional exasperation.

Many times, you'd want to throttle these people, take them by the collar and shake some choice words into their thick skulls; say chum, how many times are you going to tell me about your fucking childhood, your tedious experiences in high school when you were at that awkward stage and your folks just never understood, or that unfortunate time you stepped on a toothpick at home, rightly stabbed it into your sole by virtue of body weight, and you were all alone, scared to death about contracting the flesh-eating bacteria that would slowly consume your internal organs?

Sometimes, it might be interesting to bring up your trists with the Staphylococcus but most times, people don't really care.

Or, perhaps it's just less tiring to always have a conversation that centers on how maligned you were at the college dinner and dance when everyone thought you were the arse who spiked Betty's drink, because sometimes, people just need a good, earnest, non-imposing conversation, without being given the holier-than-thou treatment.

If there's anything I've learnt from things that can't talk, say, animals and inanimate objects, is that if there is one way to tackle people like that, its simply, really, just nipping it in the bud.

Bite his bits off (ask questions later).

Thank dog its Sunday

2007-08-26T17:43:00.000+08:00

I headed to the expo this morning for my shift at the SPCA booth and mentally slapped myself for forgetting to charge the camera battery last night. Predictably, the power went out halfway through my shift and I missed out on some sweet mutts. I ran into some familiar faces from the dog run last month and had a chat with their pet, a nice old man.

For the first time, I scrutinised a poster of animal abuse and saw photos of a dying poodle at a HDB lift lobby, a stray cat with both ears cut off and another with its side scalded. The photo of the last cat was like a huge, bloody version of the bunny carcass we saw on east coast, and now more than ever I am convinced that the bunny was a scald victim prior to its unfortunate demise. How anyone can find it in their hearts to do such things is beyond me.

Oh cheerrup; funny dog photos to appreciate here:

Kampong Lorong Buangkok

2007-08-24T23:23:00.000+08:00

I must enjoy my days of leisure to the full before I join the workforce full-time. Oh what a boring bunny I will be. A duck saved me from a boring Friday with a trip to Singapore's last kampong in Buangkok.

Situated on the east bank of Sungei Punggol off Yio Chu Kang Road, Lorong Buangkok snakes through the low-lying kampong that is prone to flooding. Quaint houses flank the lorong along with the more rustic ones that house anything from chicken runs to junk yards on their front porches. As we explored the area, a cloud of mosquitoes followed us so mozzie-gear is advised for any visit in the future. Past the banana plantations and tall grasses lies a healthy stretch of forest that was home to many gorgeous animals (see his flickr for pics). I spotted many fat golden ant mimic spiders that looked like velvet ants but they were too frisky to have their picture taken.

We arrived there after a rainstorm and the place was absolutely soaked. I wonder what it must be like during the spring tides! Many friendly dogs inspected us as we explored the kampong (which must have to do with my smelling of 21 dogs and 13 cats from a bunny roll-around in the shelter that morning) and its outskirts. Later, we met a couple of playful pups gnawing on the remains of a pineapple.

We walked for over 3 hours in the entire area but didn't see enough cos I was thoroughly throbbing with mozzie bites and said maybe we should get out of there? We'll definitely go back there soon.

Bedtime stories

2007-08-22T23:46:00.000+08:00

Now showing at hosay cinemas

2007-08-19T19:17:00.000+08:00

I implore

2007-08-17T02:25:00.000+08:00

Today, my best friends of 10 years said that I should pursue a career in erotic literature.

“When I look at you, I think ‘porn’,” Kay Lii giggled, peering at me knowingly through the thick frames of her spectacles.

Strolling among bookshelves in MPH earlier tonight, we came across a table display with featured books. Laid somewhat inappropriately between flanking rows of celebrated classic authors such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Ernest Hemmingway, were tall stacks of erotic literature with sleazy covers.

Gingerly, Kay Lii picked up a pink one with some permutations of the words “heart” and “sweat” among others, and raised her eyebrows.

“This just might be your calling,” she says.

“Yeah,” Tammy chimed. “Why try so hard looking elsewhere when the answer has been here all along?”

I look on in horror as my friends shuttle outside to the café, discussing a potential book idea.

“We can call the first one ‘I like your banana’,” Tammy squeals enthusiastically.

It seems I’m not the only one keen on a risky career move. “You can be my assistant,” I replied. What will I tell Mum? I wonder.

Tammy is worried about starting late on a recent offer as an accounts exec. “Should I just take this other offer? But… I don’t want to be doing that.”

I toy with my cell phone, clearing the day’s history of text messages. I pause at a message I sent to Ellen this morning in my drugged, half-conscious state at 7am, telling her that I had to cancel dog walks today at the shelter. I’d been having a hellish night battling a fierce sniffle and sore nasal lining, leading to insomnia and a pounding headache until 4am when the codeine finally kicked in.

This morning, every bone in my body felt wrong.

I wonder if my body is sabotaging me. Or is it simply a victim of my poor will to meet with commitments that don’t seem to matter as much anymore? I started dog walking last summer, partly to do something I never had the time to, but mostly to get my mind off someone who had left.

Is my body failing me slowly because I simply have no confidence in it? I write now more than ever, to improve, to occupy myself, and I seek a purpose in what I’m doing, but nothing reassures me that all this is not going to the shits.

Yet, I fool everyone.

Kay Lii tosses the napkins on the table while Tammy teeters on her unstable, lanky frame, squeaking about how she would fail miserably as a waitress, and nervously serves us our dinner.

“You know,” she said, once properly settled. “I think I will wait for the call. You and I, us three, we know what we want to do.”

And that’s fine I suppose. We know we need time, time to try, to find the opportunity, to be given a chance.

“Don’t be a sellout, Tam.” Kay Lii said.

I want so badly to feel useful, and frighteningly, to be better than mediocre. But I don’t want to be a sellout and be wildly successful on the outside, but tragically miserable inside.

(Un)pleasant finds on East Coast

2007-08-13T17:22:00.000+08:00

Early this morning in pre-dawn darkness, we set out to find them elusive 'nems at east coast and found many small blobs like this, ranging from as small as 0.5cm to about 2.5cm across the oral disk, and at least 6 types.

Later on, despite east coast being so beat up and rubbish laden, we found some pleasant surprises including a 'tiger' moon snail, the usual funny hermit crabs and a nice fat brittle star.

Not so pleasant was this find (warning: the squeamish should not view) of a labbit carcass washed up on the shore. It was quite big, but the body was not bloated at all and the eyes were intact so any incident must have been rather recent. Only some fur on the snout and ear was missing. Ruling out acts of cruelty, I was thinking the bunny could have fallen into a nearby canal and got washed out to the sea, maybe by accident or it was chased by a cat? I am exercising much control over the imagination right now.

I don't know why the eyes are so telescopic looking, perhaps somehow misshapen and half-falling out of the sockets after sloshing in the sea for some time and losing its eyelids.

Lil sisters island

2007-08-12T15:21:00.000+08:00

Possibly one of the most tiring shore trips, we started on the island at 330am and just kept exploring til sunrise. Despite the lack of sleep (I, subsequently teetering off balance more than a few times, stepping on a big mystery fish (guilty and freaked out at the same time) and talking rubbish), the wildfilms team was cheerful and revelled enthusiastically in the beauty of lifeforms so alien to the terrestial world. Sadly, no one spotted the anemone we set out to sample. But we saw many octopi, flatworms, nudis, huge unidentified fishes, crabs, brittle stars, an acorn worm, burrowing wrasse and this gorgeous fiery red feather star.

I don't know much about hairy crabs but this one seemed rather unusual (Prof Ng says its Pilumnus sluiteri)

Today's a first for me encountering a pizza anemone (Cryptodendrum), Marcus got a nice close up of some symbionts in there.

Chay Hoon spotted this cute lil frog fish

There's more at the wildfilms blog, check out the scorpion fishes I missed :x

Advantage of multi-purpose ears #46

2007-08-10T14:37:00.000+08:00

Inspired by yc. :D

I'm tired of finding the answers; the search is killing me.

Choclit Mewsium

2007-08-05T17:39:00.000+08:00

Kusu and other trips

2007-08-02T23:05:00.000+08:00

Today at Sungei Buloh marked the end of the anemone trips with Dr. Daphne and aw I wasn't there. Interview this morning went well but that's beside the point. Having tagged along and trying to be a useful eyeball on the trips to Changi, Hantu, Sisters and Kusu, I've become rather fond of Dr. Daphne; she's patient and sweet when I ask silly questions and there's certainly lots we've all learnt from her. She leaves on Sunday and we're all sad to see her go. She's such a joy to have on field trips; always chirpy despite the back-to-back pre-dawn mud treading. Thanks Ria and RMBR for making these trips happen.

I ♥ Singapore

2007-07-29T18:13:00.001+08:00

More of Greece (and commencement "movie night")

2007-07-23T00:47:00.000+08:00

I spoke too soon; another door has promptly slammed in my face (and only through fault of overzealous bureaucracy), and to think my hand was halfway in there reaching for the icing already. I cheer myself up with more photos of my trip to Greece last month. If only I could move to a Greek island...

Also, the University Scholars Commencement dinner saw many clever (and surprisingly low-budget) costumes paraded to celebrate the theme "dress-as-your-favourite-movie-character" night. I like to think our Charlie's Angels get-up was rather ingeniously lame.

hantunemones?

2007-07-21T03:43:00.000+08:00

It was a fruitful morning low tide as the anemone seekers tried hard (often very frustrating to watch) to sample these elusive creatures but it was an enlightening experience nonetheless; both listening to Dr Daphne and my trailing Marcus as he bestowed some interesting trivia in between taking photos of our finds. The bunny eyes were sharp that morning!

Dog walk at SPCA this morning was perplexing; a dog I always walk suddenly decides he doesn't like to walk without a friend, only moving his fat ass when another walker brought out his kennel neighbour.

I had the most fun with kay and tam tonight and boy, was it a first time properly grooving together in our 10 years of friendship. Oh, and the surgeon removed the stitches today. Strange feeling. I'd somehow developed a certain... fondness to the sutures. Hmm.

In other news, things may be looking up in the job search; I'm keeping the bunny toes crossed!

Post-partum pain

2007-07-13T21:54:00.000+08:00

No, I wasn't pregnant. I removed a bad salivary gland today and the post-op pain is... painful. I kept my eyes opened throughout the surgery so I could watch the surgeon work (so brave right!). The glasses they gave me protected my eyes from the blinding light overhead, while the doctor's bedside manners kept me amused despite the swelling numbness and gum aches. "Ohh beautiful, what a nice incision." "Oh look at it, so cute, it's like a little grape." as I grunted my muted responses to his comments.

I didn't get a photo of my salivary gland floating in formaldehyde because of poor bunny memory to remind self to do so, but this site gives a pretty mean summary of the surgery (warning: bloody). 4 stitches; the cut seems very big. I hope it heals quick, it's so hard to talk or eat anything :'(

Class of 2007

2007-07-07T00:31:00.000+08:00

We were so proud of Spencer and his speech drew tears in more ways than one! I will dearly miss these friends. Team mates, study companions, friends, club colleagues, these people are very special indeed. Surprise visit from Abel! Thanks for the flowers :)

Hot bunny post-it

2007-06-30T12:59:00.000+08:00

I've been running a fever since Thursday and just when I thought it would go away it's back again this morning. If this keeps up, I might check myself into the A&E later this evening. I just hope I survive this strange illness. Stay healthy my friendsies.

Update: Hola friends. So the scare last night at Tan Tock Seng was nothing to worry about. They didn't find anything wrong with my platelet count and am free of dengue. So I sweated out the remaining throbbing fever attacks and miraculously am cool-headed this Sunday evening. Let's hope it doesn't happen again :s

A bunny and other animals

2007-06-24T15:21:00.000+08:00

This picture pretty much sums up this morning's dog run. I haven't coo-cooed and coddled anything for a long time (and I still do not understand how human babies are adorable. I mean, seriously, compare our hairless "michelin man" babies to this sweetie!). What an adorable little baby husky. It's hard to believe she's going to grow that much!

(Btw, the tee shirt says "Sit lah!". Buy one!)

Greece: we are an amorous bunch

2007-06-10T18:57:00.000+08:00

Oh I have no patience to deal with all you lousy photo sharing webbies omgsnnnorrezz. With the sad 100mb limit on flickr, I've uploaded pictures of only my tour of the greek islands and wanderings of athens, sans the museum pictures. That leaves about oh, just a few gbs of photos of Delphi, Olympia, Meteora... Mycenae and Epidaurus. Agh, the bunny is not a patient one.

Greece was amazing. Greek men are highly flirtatious, and murderously goodlooking, while I cannot say the same about the women. Everything was perfect, except perhaps the food, the overbearing advances of european men and the bunny falling sick on the way back from Meteora. I will blog about the travels in more detail later, oh hail procrastination. Meanwhile, exciting intertidal trips await this June, as well as more commiserating on my sad, unemployed, slobby state. Hurrah hurrah, summer is here. ... ... ... ...............

Hot G(r)eek Buns

2007-05-23T21:49:00.000+08:00

P. Sekudu from the boat.

Spot the bunny! :D We headed to P. Sekudu, a small outcrop of rocks (between mainland and P. Ubin) that may seem like little excuse for an island, but super low tide reveals a gorgeous expanse of intertidal wilderness and scattered granite boulders that add to the scenic charm of this tiny island.

This is called "amphibious" landing. I love it. "We're here!" *splosh* That is Ubin behind the boat.

Lovely. The sun, steadily climbing on the horizon.

Pretending to be invisible. So adorable. Look closely, is 'she' gravid?

So cute la. Hermit crab says "Wha-?? Is it safe... is it safe to come out now?"

Check out the size of these carpet anemones! The water was crystal clear, the clouding is my clumsy bunny feet stirring up the sediment. There were many more critters that ria's already blogged about.

In other news, I will be airborne in a few hours. Meanwhile, the bunny is absolutely shagged out from rising at the ungodly hour of 6am this morning, followed by a draining 2-hour essay test and interview, more errands to run, pack, a hop by the airport to send off a whole bunch of India-bound nerds, quick dinner and more packing. The bunny also sends her love to her bitches; don't miss me :D Tammy, be strong! Everything will be ok. Time with family will help I'm sure. Kay, you'll be alright :) Tany I dunno if you can read this because hello? I don't see you usin' no broooooaadband? But I kees you anyway. Meme, you MIAed for so long! I'm amazed you went to so many places on the west side. So, like, are you sending me chocolates or what?

Guys, there is also nothing to buy in Greece yeah, save for... dates, olive oil and nuts. Honest! But I'll see what can be done. I tell you, the hotel loot would be the most exotic thing to bring back la. So you guys can fight over who ends up with the shower cap and sewing kit. No bidding allowed.

Bunny love.

Graduation toast (ohdearican'tbeaslobanymore)

2007-05-07T01:34:00.000+08:00

Watched phantom with gabe on Thursday night (which was great but reassured me that Singaporeans have zero theatre etiquette), winebar for our graduation toast with the girls on Friday night after hectic packing up of the grimy hostel room, SPCA on Saturday morning and some shopping later on, dinner with the folks and drinks with some good old friends at acid bar at night. Mad moving out and recovery today, and... Great, now, ...on to the job search (or, prep for Greece!). (Can I just be a slob for a bit longer....)

Muffin

2007-05-06T16:19:00.000+08:00

The weekend's been madness, what with a profound lack of sleep, mad rushing to meet with friends, family, move out of the hostel and a strange web absence of a whole 2 days! My meme is leaving today boohoo. And I've lots of stupid photos of her in a sexy dress and retarded ones of the girls that I will post up sooner or later, once I get down to finishing up that poster for my prof.

Today, yc's dog Muffin was euthanised about an hour ago. He put up a fight to the very end, being the tough dog he was. Poor boy was suffering and scared but it had to be done. As I comfort yc over the phone, I'm heart broken for his family and him, and sad about how our pets become such a part of our families that when they have to go, it's madly painful to make the necessary decisions.

And I am reminded of Socks, and how she passed on not long ago. The memory has stuck with me so hard I find it hard to remember her in any way but the way she died.

I stayed up with her all night, through her seizures and constant pain, until morning when I collapsed into bed and refused to head to the vet's with my parents. I am reminded how I didn't even have the balls to carry her to the clinic, and comfort her as she went down, because I didn't want to face it, I didn't want to see her die. I went to sleep in the morning and when I woke, she was gone, and the house was empty, and I felt regret, and self-loathing, and that I'd disappointed her so much in the last stretch. More than ever, I want to turn back time, to be the one to carry her in the car, onto the cold ground on which she will lie, scared, trembling in fits and fear, to comfort her, to hold her, to say goodbye for the last time.

But I didn't. I'm proud of yc for doing it, and I will never know what it is like to be there with my dog, while she dies, when she stops breathing, and to say I was with her til the end. I miss her terribly, and I will miss Muffin too, for what little opportunity I had to know him. He was tender, loving and kind, and I wish he is happy now.

Existential transition: graduation/unemployment

2007-05-03T16:58:00.000+08:00

My last exam this morning was a killer, right to the very end. It spared no means to torture my classmates and I, poor honours students who thought cell biology could not get any worse than the nightmare 2 years ago. But gootbye Free Radical Biology, hello erh, post-traumatic-exam-experience-angst unemployment. But I had some good times in this institution, and a select few friends who may be idiots but well we've stuck together in more ways than one. Eye keeess you all. *slurps*

Eh meiyu goot luck!

Amaizeing humour

2007-04-28T22:35:00.000+08:00

It's times like these I dunno whether to laugh or cry. My Meme and Spencer... they bring "corny" to a whole new level.

spencer: where you going holiday?

me: greece

spencer: ehh...never say
so you get to hear all those popular songs again lah
like we go together
sandy
greece lightning

~

me: woah i tell u.
today, i had nasi lemak, and omg, instead of kunning, i had 2 SHISHAMO!!! woah happiness.

meme: what is shishamo?

me: you know, that japanese fish you fry and the belly is full of roe?

meme: OHHH i don't like roe.

me: oh, i love roe.

meme: good, we don't have to worry about having a row over roe.

me:...
spencer says "arrgh"

meme: ask him what is his proe-blem.

spencer: (on meme's corniness) she really roe-s to the occation huh?
she not the only one that can be corny roe

me: (28hours later)
MEME I HAVE A COMEBACK!
it may be a day late, but i have it! are u ready for it:
"you will ROE THE DAY we had a row over roe!!"

meme: not bad not bad! do as the roe-mans do!

me: (defeated)

Happy(?) Earth Day

2007-04-22T23:43:00.000+08:00

I nearly forgot this backlog from eons ago, and this is probably the best time to put it up. Some bunny luck for the bunny lovers' upcoming exams, and my friends Mei and Abel - for their fyp presentations as well.

WilderN'US

2007-04-21T22:46:00.000+08:00

I don't know if many NUS students realise what a lovely campus we have. Nestled on a ridge with much (not that much but enough I suppose) lush secondary forest, our campus is nicely landscaped with wayside trees covered in epiphytes, my favourite eye candy in NUS. We were taking the usual walk through Ridge View Residences from lunch at YIH back to our labs, when we noticed the resident squirrel bounding up to a palm tree. This wasn't the first time I encountered this bugger, but when we realised there were 2 of them, I whipped out the camera to capture their antics on digital film. Then as we approached within 3 feet of the pair, we saw a little baby! The parents bounded down the corridor as if in play, leaving the baby on the palm tree to fend for itself.

One of my favourite things to do on the way to school on the ISB is to eyeball the trees along the road flanking the hospital. There, someone (I'm sure) once propogated a number of large clumps of pigeon orchids on the trees, along with huge staghorn ferns and a couple of bird's nest ferns. I like to look out for the flowers of the pigeon orchid, because when I see them, I think the day will turn out alright. I know I'm a pessimist.

Pigeon orchids bloom when there is a sudden drop in temperature, usually in Singapore that would be after a bout of heavy rain. Their flowers only last 2 days before dying. I took this photo at twilight before our delightful lil party last week.

About a month and a half ago, I'm not sure how many of you noticed the pair of oriental white-eyes constructing a nest in the branches of the sea almond tree between the 1st and 2nd floors of S2, outside the biology labs.

Over the course of their nesting, some people from the museum came by to take photos of them, and every time we walked by after class or roamed about during a break from the labs, we'd drop by the corridor and hang out with the birds. 3 chicks hatched, and I remember when I took breaks from the thesis and term papers, watching the parents take turns to forage and feed their chicks, til they were big enough to stand up in the nest and stretch their wings.

We salvaged the nest about 2 or 3 weeks after the family abandoned it.

Impending graduation

2007-04-17T22:52:00.000+08:00

It didn't matter that almost all of us had a term paper to submit a day later, or that some of us couldn't take alcohol to save our lives, or that the watermelon was cut on a stack of old newspaper with grubby hands, or that the fish was too spicy for anyone to stomach, or that some boys were too drunk to walk straight, or that some of us prior to the party had never had a decent conversation with each other. The point was, we all made it and honours year was a blast for the better parts. How apt to end it off with a proper gathering in the department garden, using a menagerie of equipment from various labs and lab pantries, nobody fretting about what time to head back to the lab because their gels were running, or had to zip off to the southern islands for a dive. The amount of g33k in the atmosphere was astounding. From repeated insistence from some to "Save plastic because it is earth day tomorrow" to telling an idiot that "yes people do sell shark meat and I can't believe you bought it!!! ("Boo!")" to "hah! Botanists are cooler, we're more... erh... evolved than you erh... bryophytologists!". After that it gets too n3rd to be g33k that it's no longer c00l.

I am going to miss these guys. Most of them turned up in the tee shirt! Sadly, after chilling in the marine lab pantry after cleanup, we received a frightening call that had us sprint down the hill to help out; and it had me sleepless for most of the night.

Graffitti bunnies in more vertical goodness

2007-04-15T15:49:00.000+08:00

Bunnies never give up

2007-04-14T01:00:00.000+08:00

It's finally done.

2007-04-11T21:29:00.000+08:00

Almost there but not quite. An ISM paper and 3 exams to go. But today, brief relief.

Betraying my arachnid calling

2007-04-06T02:10:00.000+08:00

You really must visit this site at Calacademy and read about and watch these amazing critters in action. They make our ferraris and dewalts look dated! Madagascar is simply amazing. The saddest thing is that at the rate we're clearing our forests and damaging the environment, all these fascinating animals, and those we've yet to discover, will disappear forever. I mean, check out the jaws on that bugger! I stumbled upon this while reading up on the first truely social spitting spiders for my thesis.

Meanwhile, do visit a new link on the sidebar for really cool insect photography!!! Like this photo of a living bridge of Eciton burchelli, an army ant from america.

In other news, um, well there's no other news. Nothing that screams a compelling need to be splat updated on the blog. Well, there was the honours presentation which was on Tuesday that went surprisingly well, to my relief, despite being allocated two evolution profs, one of whom has feared notoriety for being, well, frightening. Luckily, the hours of last minute reading, support from some lab people (and surprisingly, a supportive Mr. Hsu who turned up to marvel at everybody's project on the day itself) as well as some quick thinking at some tough questions, I'd think I pulled through rather alright. Now that the thesis draft is finally done, it's time to do some serious proof reading, and then it's on to a 3 day sprint to research and prepare for the next term paper and presentation, which then leaves me a week to study for 3 papers. Like many people tell me, I'm really stretching myself for the last semester as an undergrad. What a way to go.

Oh, and Mr. Mort committed suicide some time on Wednesday, probably by violently hurling himself out of the tank, onto my desk, possibly flip-flopping around until he found the edge, and plummetted to the floor, and died from desiccation. Meme think it's cos I cursed him with the name Mr. Death and gave him bad luck to begin with, which could explain why Mr. Thor is so strong and healthy now. I might just name my next one 'Scurvy' and see what happens, while we're testing this naming phenomenon.

An unfunny bunny

2007-04-01T01:01:00.000+08:00

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

Losing steam, and not even half past

2007-03-27T23:14:00.000+08:00

Bunny disappearing act

2007-03-23T23:42:00.000+08:00

Deadlines are looming, and one major one is just 2 days away. 3 days of sleepless (honestly) nights to meet the draft deadline today and this is what I have to show for it, after incorporating useful suggestions for improvement from my prof and some very nice friends in and out of the lab who had the time to give it a look through. The actual shit is 36x40 inches so its pretty effing huge.

Next up, free radical biology presentation on thursday I'm utterly jittery over, honours defense on the 3rd, thesis due on the 11th, with conservation presentation on the same day, and the term paper due the week after. Trust me, this is it. I mean honestly. I'm so effing in the shits.

First ever bunnycomic

2007-03-15T23:34:00.000+08:00

I say first ever bunnycomic but it's in no reference to the comic Bunny. Actually, the frames are deliberately reminiscent of Kris' comics in cyanide&happiness. But other than that lack of originality, I am proud to present to you my ~~first~~ second attempt (ok, but first serious attempt) at drawing a comic! I am rather pleased with it.

Drifting

2007-03-13T23:25:00.000+08:00

You know something? If I really got down to it, I could finish the entire first 2 thirds of the thesis by now and send it in to the prof. But it's things like getting sick of fumbling foolishly with MS Word formatting, eyes getting sore with dryness, restless caffeine-bunny-energy, being mind-bogglingly BORED with the thesis and the lack of panic that during this time of semester should be motivating me to get on with my other research papers and presentations, that make me go do something stupid like sketch. And with the amount of time spent on my ass in the library or refusing to get up in the mornings, I might just end up looking like that yellow bunny.

Mr. (petit) Mort

2007-03-07T17:48:00.000+08:00

And so, a trip to the aquarium to purchase fish food ended up in the bunny carting a new tank and another fish home. This is Mr. Mort, and I fell in love with him the moment I set eyes on him. He, gills flaring and fins fully spread, probably from agitation from my constant poking and disgusting lip-puckering in his face. But I know he's a happy fish! He gets to freak out when I let him look at Thor. He also gets to play find the worms (my little game, where he has to flip onto the leaf on the surface of the water to get to the worms :b), but Thor beats him fins down. Skinny bugger but oh, so gorgeous. Welcome Mort!

When I grow up

2007-03-04T16:32:00.000+08:00

Talk of marriage and career seems to dominate my conversations with my best friends lately. Most strikingly though, is how, I, once a proud rebel of convention, have become more and more upset with not meeting (or being unlikely to meet) the conventional ideals that we've been raised to accept as the paths to a predetermined desired state. These ideals being: graduate, get a good job, secure it with benefits, settle down, have children; and do all this before you hit 30.

Hey, women don't age very gracefully, provided you have artificial, expensive, surgical aid. Secondly, my childbearing machinery isn't getting any younger and the babycentre tells me that I will be 25% more likely to be infertile at 30 than now. Third, where am I going to get the money to settle down if I don't have a well-paying job that I enjoy, and lastly, where the hell am I supposed to find this person to settle down with? Note that I also assume that this person has genes good enough to complement mine so that ~~in time, our offspring can take over the world~~ we will make good babies together.

Speaking with single friends like myself who are surrounded by other friends that are in relationships, engaged, or married, I find myself getting more and more upset with the profound lack of reassurance that I'm not heading for spinsterhood in the distant future. And, fearing that this may turn out to be a column reeking of Sumiko Tan-spinster wallowing trash, I now ask myself; when did I start to subscribe to these ideologies?

I thought I was past the age of youthful idealism, and perhaps I'm stuck in between that, and my adult aspirations. My energetic, young ego wants to go to grad school, come out and make a difference in my country, rise to an influential position and make things happen. My jaded self wants to bloody get a job and make some money, find myself a smart boyfriend and get married. Oh my gosh, I just did it, I sound like Sumiko Tan.

I am nervous, insecure, unsure about the future and my own capabilities to acheive those long-term goals. To make things worse, I've just abandoned all hope of having a stable relationship with someone I once thought to be the only one I'd ever want to be with. And to top it all off, people around me are being very happy with their other halves and getting married, and making big plans because they've gotten excellent job offers, even before they graduate.

But... but you're only young once. Satisfy your wanderlust, see the world, try every goddamned flavour in the frozen yoghurt section, check out the damned mixed grill buffet, life is too damned short.

Where are my own ideals? Is this it, just because everyone else is doing it, or is it because I just don't know what other option there is? And why am I thinking about all this shit when my thesis is due in a few weeks?!

Much ado about Chinese New Year

2007-02-19T00:15:00.000+08:00

Happy Spring Festival

2007-02-17T17:15:00.000+08:00

It's finally here! ~~The solution to my flailing bank account!~~ Happy New Year bunny lovers, I hope you like the card. Yijun says the chinese characters are correct (see, I checked first to save from embarassment). Abs had some creative input to this. And the pig is really thinking "wtf man, that's one big orange!!"

Spring Fish

2007-02-16T11:43:00.000+08:00

I am leaving Thor for the Chinese New Year break and I just know he is going to miss me. I just hope he hangs in there (read: stays alive) for the 5, 6 days I'm gone, since I can't seem to find him a temporary friend in the hostel to look after him. (Don't you think I drew him out to look very much like an SBS Transit mascot?)

I've got this new pair of shoes of an obscure brand Speedy Rhino. I am told this aptly describes me.

Rhinoceroses are universally recognized because of their massive bodies, stumpy legs and either one or two dermal horns. In some species, these may be short or altogether not obvious.

Although not inclined to approaching humans, rhinos may exhibit bursts of aggressiveness. Fortunately for their enemies, their poor eyesight prevents them from making targeted attacks. Their sense of smell and hearing however is well developed.

From WWF

I'm not sure it's a compliment.

A Valentine

2007-02-14T02:02:00.000+08:00

Mr. Thor (On [swamp]Weed)

2007-02-13T00:26:00.000+08:00

Learning to laugh all over again

2007-02-12T17:42:00.000+08:00

The prof said today that the most important organs in the body are always well protected "inside the body, not outside, like the heart."

Meme extrapolated: So anything that is outside the body is not important?

Me: Like testicles!

Well. Okay, not very intelligent conversation in class but amusing nonetheless.

Waking Up

2007-02-08T17:26:00.000+08:00

Time to wake up and face it all again. It seems what is expected of me.

Regret

2007-01-15T22:42:00.001+08:00

Animals have problems too

2007-01-11T16:33:00.000+08:00

I'm starting to see why holing oneself up in a room with a reasonably functional PC and broadband connection can be very comforting. I've become a geek and that's nothing to be ashamed of! For aesthetic purposes, since the bunny site is desperately boring and dull, I'm putting up my favourite piece here (click it: it's a cute rat.), from Animals have problems too.

Jln Penis

2006-12-26T12:11:00.000+08:00

Don said I should have 'Stomped' this but 1. I don't know how, 2. Endorsed blogging on a frivolous site run by a politically partial newspaper is not exactly something I'd like to embrace, 3. I'd want to put this up on my own site first. In any case, this is way overdue, mostly because the connection at home cannot reach google/blogger, which really ruined the weekend!

'Jln Remis' was vandalised sometime last week and remained so for a few days before it was cleaned on Saturday. I had intended to take a photo of the ingenious vandalism but due to laziness, had put it off til Saturday morning, and how lucky I was to have caught it right before they came to clean it off. Excellent way to start the Christmas weekend!

The Spider Orgasm

2006-12-20T18:41:00.000+08:00

My spiders probably experience more sexual pleasure than anyone of us. Thus far, out of almost 20 females I've put in the mating ring, courtship (or foreplay) lasts 22 minutes at the longest, and copulation (or sex) lasts up to 53 new record: 70 minutes! This is a fascinating result, considering mating in Paraceba for example, lasts in the seconds, while many other spider species, like other Scytodids and Salticids, last up to a few minutes only. I can think of a few reasons for the high reproductive success of this spider, among them; nutritional status (all healthy and well-fed), low natural population density (thus high reproductive investment in the first mate encountered), low incidence of predation in the natural habitat (thus cost of being eaten while copulating is lower than benefit of a long mating period?) ... ?.

A reliable source tells me his flies mate for up to a few hours. Mind-boggling stuff.

But of course, they can't actually feel any pleasure. How tragic.

So that's what I've been up to. The bunny appreciates that you do not sneer at the evident lack of a social life this holiday season.

xkcd: Shoot outside the battlefield

2006-12-07T23:52:00.000+08:00

Perhaps it's because of the boys I hang out with, or the game module that I just took, that is making me appreciate more and more, the hilarious geek humour on the internet. Penny Arcade's recent dig at Rainbow Six's inadequacies, along with other comic moments like the antics of Halo players, just gets me ~~so horny~~ rolling on the floor. I even downloaded Bookworm Adventures after reading about Tycho's inane fixation on spelling. I've since completed my stupid free trial, before exams were over :x

Field trip again

2006-11-29T18:27:00.000+08:00

I'm feeling a little guilty dragging 3 grad students with me up to Gombak to help me in my collection, and especially dear jaded Jeremy, who really has better things to do, assuming he has more fun grading papers and cursing "pesky undergraduates" every few minutes than driving 3 girls up to ulu land and back, putting up with our inane nonsense.

So we got lost a few times, in particular trying to get out of a rather tricky situation with the 10123 flyovers just outside UM in KL, trying to navigate in wonderful Malaysian road planning, to get on the right highway out of the damned place. Though we were panicky about the fuel guage most of the trip, we neglected to check it on the way back and had to detour in Kulai and got lost in the process of finding a Petronas petrol kiosk. We were more than ready to battle it out with the mozzies and cold water at the Gombak field station again, (un)fortunately, there was some camp going on there and we were forced to spend my precious grant money on a luxurious stay in the Genting hotels. Oh, heated water, oh electricity, oh, no mosquitoes!

After a whole day of collection at Gombak, we managed to catch almost 40 specimens. That's 3 times as many as the first time. So we rewarded ourselves with a trip up to the top of Genting to watch Casino Royale. Oh James, you are so manly. Your manliness is just too much for me. Oh. Oh. Mmmmhfhgfsdkjshfjgarow;ie;fisdjvncx.

Then of course, we get lost on the way up to Cameron, but it's ok. We managed. Thank goodness for the GPS.

Back to reality at home and a week's worth of study, yesterday's animal paper just blew me away. Don't worry, I've mourned and gotten over it somewhat.

note: see previous post for more field trip photos.

Update November

2006-11-14T00:25:00.000+08:00

It's been ages - I don't even want to talk about it.

Remember the really really ugly spider I brought back from the caves of Gunung Senyum in September? Maybe this will jog your memory:

So I did some reading and its an unidentified species of huntsman. Anyway. I brought it back, it habited a rather small cage (for it's rather huge size of approximately 12cm across if legs were fully stretched -- I must shamefully admit to being too lazy at the time to prepare a larger cage.), and to my (and lab mates) horror, SHE laid a patch of eggs. I nearly couldn't handle the amount of UGLY POTENTIAL that little 1cm patch of eggs was capable of. One huge ugly spider was a cool pet -- a whole cage full of little uglies -- I'm not so sure. The image alone boggles the mind.

That said, the eggs hatched very nicely, and we decided it was time to move mummy ugly out to a larger cage, seeing as how the added misery of staying in a small cage, plus the potential ugliness of having all her little uglies running around and climbing all over her, and the plain fact the she herself, is ugly -- makes for a whole load of ugly. Not wanting to breed anymore ugly, I generously donated the little uglies to a lab mate whose aranaephagic spiders were in need of food.

On a lighter note, Meme and I finally completed our ISM review papers and conquered the presentation - which really turned out to be an hour-and-a-half long discussion session (i.e. pretty presentation slides wasted, tho he did give em a read-through.). We learnt a few things, and I'm sure Dr. Peter did too, even from two humble honours students.

Lessons have closed for the semester, save for a test and consultation session this Wednesday and the big media project presentation this Thursday. It always amazes me how you can make anything a module in university, especially in USP. So today I was thinking back on the last 3 years and what insanely silly/inane modules I'd taken.

There was Chem & Us, which was really just on industrial processes - not easy, not enjoyable, but had a field trip to APB that had us leave all red and not very sober after an hour of free beer. There was Cyberart, which was insanely fun partly because of the profound lack of the need to do any readings - and the fact that class was really a 4-hour long sit-in-a-circle-and talk-about-what-you-think-of-art session -- you can almost see Dr. I passing around a smoking stick of weed and us, cross-legged in a rolling meadow, one guy with long braids strumming lazily on a guitar. That and our projects were how fun! Make a website, make a video, call it art, get your A-minus. :D

And now in media class we talk about games and play games and make games - minus the weekly blog assignments and rather profound readings, this'd be the pinnacle of inane university modules. It's almost a waste when during every class, Alex (the instructor) mentions a few games to illustrate a point -- (usually on the philosophy of gaming [= ludology] - and you'd be damned surprised to note that the whole field of ludology, yes academics!!! - they spend entire decades debating the philosophy of games. You can read more at my module blog - beware of potential brain-popping.) -- and nobody gets it because we haven't played it! And fortunately, and this is really cool by the way, Alex would have brought his PS2 to class and he'd load it up and play it to prove a point. (Speaking of which, one really cool game I remember being demonstrated in class was Okami. Anyone feeling generous? I think I could do with a PS2 and maybe a copy of Okami :D)

PhD in games anyone?

Incidentally, the bunny will be taking on the mozzie jungle of Ulu Gombak this coming weekend for a 4-day field study and spider-collection. Again, I know. (And a week before exams - I know!!!) Good news is I got the whole of December free to conduct my experiments and catch up on the dog-walks at SPCA -- time to lose weight again and get in touch with the fuzzies. I miss having a dog, I find myself calling to the turtles in the tank on level 3 of s2 like little doggies. It doesn't help that they respond - probably haven't been fed in a while.

Sigh. I'm so frustrated it's not even funny anymore.

Something for the graduating hons class of 2007

2006-11-02T01:43:00.000+08:00

USP nostalgia

2006-10-28T18:26:00.000+08:00

It's been too long since we'd sat down and had a decent conversation no centering on work or academia. The SPAN gathering last night was indeed timely for this purpose. It was so sweet to be with these people again, in particular my own graduating batch, as well as catching up on the good times with our alumni whom we all miss very much. Meme and I even found ourselves gushing, shool-girl-like, the way we used to in freshmen year, over our droolsome and very eligible seniors. So here's a pictorial commentary, with special thanks to dear Meme because she is just so good at these collage thingies. :D Thanks for the pics!