Sunday, August 26, 2007
Nothing is better than an explosive way to spend the weekend at the Malaysia International Fireworks Competition that is being held at Putrajaya. For this competition, teams from
 Golden Bridge |  fUN Fair |  Test Shot |  Show Begins |  Display . |  Star In The Sky |
We double parked at a spot near the fun fair next to the
 Explosions . |  Rambutans ? |  Explosions . |  Fan & Buzz |  Boom! . |  Bing! . |
The event started of at 10pm where the fireworks from Team
 Bang! . |  Last Few minutes |  Grand Finale |  After Week 3 |  Big . |  Droplet . |
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Once again, Im out in the field watching students for the field trips. It’s the 1st year students who are taking ENV1800 subject this time. Similar to the class last year, the class this year is that big, the field trip had to be carried out on three separate occasions. As usual, we would bring the students to the Kelana Jaya tin mine lake and the Gombak forest. Unlike the previous years, this time we had to take out one location in Gombak to save time showing the students around in the field.
 At Lake |  Tin Mine Lake |  & Snail Eggs |  Snail Eggs |  Sampling with Students |  Strangling Fig Tree |
Quite like the students this year as they are rather cooperative and show some interest in what they are doing in the field, unlike previous years where quite a few even would hesitate getting into the water. Brought my new camera around to subject it to the ‘Yong’ test. So far its only satisfactory results. Sometimes would have trouble making it understand what I wanted to focus on, especially in the macro mode. Or is it me having difficulty understanding it. There is still a lot more of each other that we need to get to know of.
 in Gombak |  Forest Floor |  Giving Briefing |  Through Forest |  Cratilla metallica |  Heliocypha perforata |
I was feeling kinda bad as I feel that Im taking photos most of the time instead of really fully attending to the students. But heck! Im the official photographer for the trips and at least I still do attend to the new kids! Luckily, Dr Cathy didn’t mind (or at least I think so) and in fact did asked me to take certain photos for use in lectures.
 Orchid Leaf |  Aristocypha fenestrella |  in Gombak River |  Gombak River |  Outbreak ? |  after Week 2 |
All the while (the past 2 – 3 years), I have never really realized how long I have been doing this until this trip. It hit me when I felt something was amiss at one of the sites where I later found out that one large tree is missing or fallen rather. It was then when I realized that Ive been around long enough to notice trees gone missing. Even the trails are getting narrower, overgrown with shrubs. I wonder how long will I be still be doing this.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
I am finally employed! However, still on a temporary basis. =( So this makes me more or less still an unemployed person until I get myself a full time job! But it sure beats doing and earning nothing sitting around bumming at home. Currently Im working as an Admin Officer for the school. Most of my work would involve dealing with building defects (since the campus building is still quite new) and ensuring physical resources to be in good condition as well as delivered when they are requested. Other than that, Im also demonstrating for all environmental field trips as well as the agricultural lab, giving me more opportunity to earn more while Im at my first job. Work can sometimes be stressful when it comes to dealing with difficult staff members, but its part of work and Im still learning the curves of it. Ever since starting work, I guess my daily lifestyle had changed a bit, that everyday I return home tired and ended up sleeping quite early every night, around 11pm. Not that I mind, its just tiring! Also, I finally found some time (and also some cash) for me to get down to Kl to get mysef a new camera! Whoopee! My previous camera now is as good as dead. Its still functioning, but its almost dead. Dead in a sense that ill have to bang it lightly a few times to get it to start up. I guess age is catching up with it, along with the stress of being ‘Yong’s camera’. A blardi good camera I should say, the Canon A80, built like a tank, been through sand, sun, snow, soil, water, impacts, u name it! Lasted me a good 3 years until now. This new camera that I have now is the Canon S5 IS. I sure hope its just as tough as the previous and could live up to the Yong endurance test. *Cross fingers*
 Little Office |  In The Office |  Briefing Students |  Young Plants |  the Plant House |  Seedlings . |
Monday, May 28, 2007
I feel troubled. I feel lost. I feel like I'm missing something but I don't know what it is. I feel like running away but I don't know what I'm running from. This path of uncertainty is messing up my mind. No, I must get my thoughts straight. Perhaps its time for me to do another soul searching.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
The long anticipated day for the field trip to Ma Daerah Turtle Sanctuary located in Kemaman, Terrenganu, finally came on the May 11th ‘ 07. With a group size of 30, we departed on a 5 hour long journey to the beach at late noon. Half the group appeared tired, each seemed to be settling down to sleep, even though its been barely an hour since the bus departed from the campus. While half the group people was in each of their own dreams, the rest of the group were actively chatting away and playing pranks on each other. For me, the trip wasn’t a good start since I was down with slight fever, a sore throat and some cold. Have been trying to get well ASAP by taking in an assorted overdose of pills. *Don’t try this kids!*
 On The Beach |  For Sunrise |  Dawn . |  Sunrise . |  Turtle Landing |  Sand Bath |
The day was already quite late when we arrived, thanks to the bad traffic conditions and being lost for a moment. We were so tired and hungry by the time we arrived, we immediately devoured on the already long prepared food without properly checking into our rooms first. After the late dinner, a briefing on the activities was supposed to be carried out but was cancelled due to an exciting news of a turtle landing. We immediately hurried off the lodge in an attempt to catch the egg laying process of the turtle. We took a long walk along the beach in the darkness to the nesting site. The use of torches was discouraged since it may scare the turtle and cause it to abort its attempt to lay eggs. As of that, we only relied on our night vision capability to navigate in the darkness. Along the beach were little specks of glowing blue light, coming off from bioluminescence organisms. By the time we reached the nest, the turtle was already done with laying the eggs, getting ready to leave the beach. Since flash photography is also discouraged, a few of us attempted to take photos of the turtle with long exposure, only to produce disappointing results. After the turtle had left for sea, we returned to the nesting site to count and collect the eggs to be brought back to the nursery. One of us (Ding Ding) had the golden opportunity of doing so. We got back to the nursery to learn the process of placing the eggs in designated sites within the nursery in an attempt to hatch those fresh turtle eggs. It was already quite late at night by then, so we each retuned to our rooms to have a good nights rest.
 Geronimo! . |  Incoming! . |  Stealing Pants |  Trail . |  View . |  My Pants! |
The accommodation provided in the lodge was very basic, equipped with only lights fan and twin beds. Most people within the group were lucky to have everything functioning in their rooms. Only us guys were lucky enough to choose a room with a non functioning fan. Since the temperature in the room was so hot, we took the adventurous idea of sleeping on the beach instead. We were joined by 2 adventurous girls for the night, Beatrice and Chien Wen. Off we went to the beach to set up our little camp under the star filled open sky. Darren brought a stove so we had a little cooking going on before settling down. Sleeping on the beach was quite a nice experience if it wasn’t for those irritating sandflies biting on our feet. Had to steal back my sleeping bag from Chis who was using it as his pillow throughout the night. The sleeping bag immediately solved my troubles with the sandflies. Other than that, there wasn’t much trouble besides the gals claiming that the morning was cold even I thought the temperature was just nice.
 Hermit Crab |  A UFO! |  Prankster Attacks! |  Yvonne Kim & I |  & 'Starfish Patrick' |  On The Rock |
We woke up early the next day in an attempt to catch the sunrise. It was a little disappointing since there was cloud cover on the horizon, so it wasn’t much of a sunrise. For the more active group f us (Beatrice, Chris, Darren, Kate, Kim, Yvonne & I) , we spent the rest of the morning hanging around the beach, swimming and playing silly acts and pranks. I wasn’t too sure on what the rest of the other groups did for the whole morning. Returned to the lodge for lunch and rest before heading out to the beach once more for another dip with another group. Entertained ourselves by playing a game of monkey using the pants of one of the guys. We spent quite sometime in the water before returning to the lodge for rest and dinner before we attended the long delayed briefing.
 Human Tower |  SPLASH!! . |  A Big Wave |  At Work |  Lodge . |  Exhibition Hall |
After the briefing, we were divided into 2 groups to conduct a beach patrol for turtle landings. While the 1st group was away, we spent our time trying to sing whatever songs we could come up with and attending a little bday party for one of us (Li hua). It took quite a while for the 1st group to return and all they gave us was the disappointing news of them spotting a turtle and accidentally scaring it away from landing. Nevertheless, the 2nd group left for patrol hoping that the scared turtle would return again for another egg laying attempt. We spent quite a while walking along the coastline in the darkness without results. Most of the people in the 2nd group were already tired by then and I guess were quite eager to get back to the lodge. While on the way back, us few who stayed out the previous night were planning to stay out another time for the night. We were a little disappointed when we got back to find that most people from the 1st group had already colonized the beach site. Having felling a little disappointed, we were wondering if we should continue with our plan when we decided to give it a go. It wasn’t too long after we started to settle down on our site b4 people from the 1st group started to return to the lodge due to attack of the sandflies. Only a few tough ones remained. Once again we had a little cooking session before settling in for sleep. While I was settling down, I overheard from the radio of one of the rangers of what sounded to be a possible turtle landing. However no notice was given for the group to catch the landing process. I waited a while for news but accidentally fell asleep.
 Beach Site |  Main Entrance |  New People |  Pass Time |  Photo Shooting |  Being Silly |
2am. “Anyone want to watch turtle landing?” Immediatly jumped up from my sleep when I heard that and bugged Beatrice to wake the rest of the group. Word was given out the wake the others and we have to hurry as the turtle was already in the final stages of its egg laying process and the nesting site was really close to where we were sleeping. What really surprised me was that only 4 of us managed to wake up. The rest were either too tired or amazingly lazy to wake up. Since we afford to cant wait any longer, the 4 of us together with the guide rushed off to catch the egg laying process. The walk to the nesting site was only less than 5 mins from where we slept! Those who didn’t tag along sure did missed a lot! We were lucky enough to catch the turtle in the midst of its egg laying. We were even overjoyed when the guide allowed us to take flash photography since the group was really small! Off went the flashes like machine gun fire. Each of us was feeling happy having taken photos with the turtle. Once again, Ding was given the golden task of collecting the eggs. After the job was done, the guide left us in the dark with the turtle. We stayed with the turtle for a while until we felt raindrops and had to rush back. When we got back to the beach site, the rest of the people who were sleeping on the beach had already disappeared. All thats left were our things and we hurriedly gathered them and headed back to the lodge b4 it started pouting. It turned out to be a short drizzle and we were too lazy to set up the camp again so we decided to head back to the lodge instead. We got back with some trouble getting a place to rest so we just slept on the porch.
 Briefing . |  Session . |  Are The Turtles?! |  Laying Eggs |  From The Oven! |  Green Turtle |
The morning air was filled with disappointment when the rest of the group learnt that they missed a spectacular event. Well, whats gone is gone and theres nothing that can be done. We spent the morning pacing up and having one last beach walk before leaving the sanctuary for home. I was sure glad that I went along for the trip since it took me weeks of indecisive ness if I should go for it as I had to pay as much as RM250 for it! Turns out, that I still haven’t paid anything and my boss Dr Cathy, never asked for it. Lets hope she forgets! =P
 Lucky Few |  Hornbill Flying |  Moments . |  By The Beach |  Group Photo |  Ma Daerah! |
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
 Jetty View |  For The Meeting |  Going Meeting |  At Site! |  Copera vitatta |  Of The Hill! |
After a month or so of procrastinating, I finally managed to drag my concrete fingers to start blogging again. So here goes, from the days after my trip to the plantation in Perak.
 of Oil Palms! |  K. Chye at work |  at work |  Pond in Plantation |  Mini Bar! |  Spying . |
The trip to the oil palm estate in
 Group Photo |  at Work |  at Work |  Ride! . |  Small Pond |  Drop . |
We started our journey on the 26th Feb with a long flight delay due to a missing co-pilot who called in sick. Bad start. Because of this flight delay, we almost missed the boat which would be taking us across the
 Cratilla metallica |  Sea of Oil Palms! |  the Tower |  Flower . |  Lotus Pond |  In Plantation |
The girls we put up in the plantations club house, which is pretty luxurious I must say. It was equipped with a pool table, home theatre system and even mini bar! No swimming pool around however. The guys on the other hand stayed over in the managers and assistants house. While the birders got to stay with one of the estate managers, I got to stay with a cheerful assistant manager by the name of Alegrandran.
 to Lake |  Birding . |  Chye at Work |  Got STUCK! |  in the Sun |  Palm Trees |
The next day we started off our work with a short opening meeting before surveying the area. The estate in
 From A Tractor |  Metallic Beetle |  Whats in the drain? |  Agrionoptera insignis |  by the Lawn |  Mangrove River |
After seeming much of the plantation, I would say this plantation would be a much better plantation compared to the previous one I visited since there are pockets of forest within it which allows some wild animals to dwell. We saw quite a mixed diversity of habitats, ranging from lowland dipterocarp forest to the mangrove forest. Highlights of our spotting would include the endangered or near threatened species such as the storms stork, oriental darter, Chinese egret, proboscis monkeys and some raptors. Although there were reports of orang utan sighting within the plantation, we saw none, but only old nests of these primates.
 Plans . |  On Water |  in Action! |  Legs . |  in Action! |  Photographing Dragonfly |
Our night watches weren’t as exciting however. We encountered several problems during our first few nights of night spotting sessions. On the first night, it was pouring really heavily so we had to call it off. On the second night, the lights on both our spotting lamps blew up no long after we started. On the third night, all went well for a while before the lights on both lamps blew up again. For the whole night survey, we didn’t see much except for the spotting of Samba deer, a family of wild boars and a couple of small owls.
 Cratilla lineata |  saw this and that.. |  Great White Egret |  Closing Meeting |  During Presentation |  And you are saying? |
We managed to finish our work fast enough to earn ourselves an extra day off. We used the day off to visit Sukau, a small settlement located next to the Kinabatangan river where there are plenty of proboscis monkeys the ride which would have only lasted 45 mins took us about an hour or so to reach there due to the terrible road conditions because of an on going construction. The road was so bumpy, I could have snapped my neck on my way there. Of course, it was also impossible to get any sleep in the jeep during the ride there.
 At Sukau |  Boat Ride |  Mangroves . |  & I |  In The Tree |  From Mangroves |
Upon reaching a lodge in Sukau with aching butts, we got ourselves a room to pack for the evening boat ride along the river. After an hour of dilly dallying we left off for the boat safari hoping to spot some animals along the river. We didn’t see much until we entered a small river flowing through a mangrove swamp. It is here where we saw plenty of wildlife; proboscis monkeys, pig tail macaques, cat snakes and even a crocodile.
As darkness approached, we headed back to the lodge for dinner before heading out again for another boat ride in the darkness. It must have been the full moon or something that we didn’t see any big mammals coming out to the river side. However, we still got to see plenty of birds which were roosting in the trees which grow along the river. For some reason, none of us were able to spot the any wildlife here, even with the experience from our night spotting outings. Only the local guides knew where to look for the birds. It seemed that they have marked specific trees where it is known that the bird would go back to roost. Throughout the night, the birds we saw were the buffy fish owl, night heron, a variety of king fishers and even the rhinoceros hornbill! The boatman would get us so close to the roosting bird that you could probably stretch out your hand and grab it while it was sleeping.
 . . |  Group Photo |  Snake! . |  Crocodile in Sukau! |  Fish Owl posing |  Kingfisher . |
We returned back to the estate late at night, tired but contented with our little holiday. Once back, we got our things packed ready for the early morning departure back to the
 Oriental Darter |  Proboscis Monkey |  Storms Stork |  Hornbill . |  Raptors At Nest |  Snake . |
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Tuesday : My journey back from the cold front was less tiring than the trip over there. The flight wasn’t really full and that was a good thing. Had no trouble sleeping. I had to stay in Hong Kong over night during my transit back home. Good thing I had a friend residing over in Hong Kong who brought me around for a short tour before I continue my trip back. During my 14 hour transit, I only managed to visit Kowloon and Mong Kok and check out the night life there. Thanks to Katherine for bringing me around!
 Canada! . |  Tour Guide Katherine |  Mong Kok . |  Hong Kong . |  Hong Kong . |
 Scouting |  Morning Watch |  Accomodation . |  Guest House . |  Checking Out A Drain |  The Plantation? |
 Sampling Site |  Ride! . |  The Mud . |  (Photo by: Sheffy) |  (Photo by: Sheffy) |  Fungi . |
 Night Survey |  . . |  Site . |  Doing Sampling |  Out There? Cookenia sp. |  Dense Plantation |
 Unknown Species |  in Bidor |  Out . |  Crotilla lineata |  Mud Again! |  Prodasineura humeralis |
 Neurothemis Terminata |  Trithemis aurora |  Filming A Dragonfly |  Heliocypha perforata |  Neurobasis chinensis |  Near The Plantation |
 Action Again |  Posing With Phone |  Working In Rain |  Drops . |  Sampling Site |  To Golf Course |
 At Work |  Unknown Species |  Rhyothemis triangularis |  A Day . |  Seri Intan |  Family! . |
 Fungi . . |  (Photo By: Sheffy) |  Spotted Wood Owl By: John |  (Photo By: John . |  The Club House . |  Operations Manager Mr Tan . |
 BBQ Treat! |  With Ops.Manager |  For Meeting |  Closing Meeting |