Vaccination Celebrations

Since I'm filled with youth, I had to wait until now to get my shots, so I'm half vaxxed; second shot in 6 weeks. This is extra great, as we have our first significant community cases here after months.

On my SG LotsaHealthy app, it shows my vaccination is in progress! (Also, I have not been in contact with anyone infected.) The same app is used for checking in/out of everywhere, enabling contact tracing and thus protection from that unmasked guy with the combover!

Did you say half-vaxxed?The otters came out to frolic, and showed off their diving moves.The giant moth came to visit, but I wasn't super keen.

My cuddle buddy Harvey Bodhi came, and he gave me head butts to celebrate!

And the huge creepy floating baby said congrats too.The hibiscus flowered yellow, and entranced us with its symmetry.In commemoration, we went to the Chihuly Glass in Bloom exhibit.Dale Chihuly, renowned American artist, makes glowy glass sculptures in the shape of coronaviruses. From an art perspective, I'm not sure these are too hard to make, but they seem hard to stick together without breakity messes. Especially shipped overseas.

I'm hoping that my body is currently preparing to fight these narsty spikes! Scary!

There's an essay to be written about art, life, and our culture here. I see the sculpture below as a more virulent variant. You?Luckily here, I thought more about how these would be nice dinner plates. Thinking about dinner is better for the mental health.This one is my favourite, because you can't tell where the art ends and the reflection starts. Much like other art forms, such as reality TV, or this blog.

I may have mentioned before that I'm not great at art, but I call this one Pupae.

And this one, Melted Dreams.

Ok, that was surprisingly somber, so let's pick it up. This weekend, after waiting 48 hours after my shot as is the recommendation here, Barry and I passed our Don't be Dumb about Wine course level 1! Now we're only moderately foolish, but unlikely to pass another level.

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Bioluminescent Mycology

The changeable lizard and I were looking for some change.

We have tired of the Sanchezia nobilis above and the shrubby dillenia, even though the latter is not invasive.

We went to this bird watching spot, but as we stared into the sun, we just saw drops of our own sweat, and the distant buildings of another country (Malaysia).

We wondered if there were creepier things than ghost hunting during the day. Although amazing find, right?

So we decided to try night hiking, since I newly learnt that our reserves don't all close at night.

Our first attempt was not successful. First, the park we chose was lit and there were other humans. All we saw was this ant superhighway.

Then we went harder core, to a park which required day scoping.

The word "park" is strong. Let's go with abandoned forest. Here, the usual abandoned plant pots (why?) fake hollow stone walkways, and a rest pavilion.

A surprising number of old wells, quite large enough in which to hide a body.

Stagnant water in Singapore can breed dengue mosquitoes, so I stayed closer to the gushing waterfall.

As a result, I got more mosquito bites in one day than in the last 13 years in Singapore combined. But this forest is different: dryer and more bamboo.

Fern forest areas.

Then we get shroomy!

After rainstorms, we have fun fungals. Above are the prickly fuzzters, and below, the beaded palm nubbins. Mycological identification eludes me.

Above, the Polyporales LaurainSingapore, as I've just decided this is a species not previously known to nature, below a more ordinary Cookeina, scoopy cuppers.

Finally, this is what we came for. They may not look like much, but you gotta scope this out during the day, because...

This is what happens at night! Thank you Filobetus Manipularis for giving us some bioluminescent excitement! And thanks Barry for figuring out the macro/aperture/holespeeds set up with the phone & tripod (better macro lens than our camera). Happy glowy shrooms!

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War, Defeat, and Rain

Fort Siloso, like several attractions in Singapore, can teach you about WW2. It didn't go well here. A key point was that the Brits were looking south, at this beach, whereas the Japanese came from the north. (Fun fact, the middle island is the Southern-most part of continental Asia, even though it's an island south of 2 increasingly larger islands, and north of Indonesia's 17 thousand islands).

They were paler than we expected.

Many war bunkers, tunnels, forts and artifacts can be seen. In fact, an unexploded Japanese bomb was found at a construction site lately.

Singapore was occupied by the Japanese during WW2, then handed back thereafter, with the locals increasingly disillusioned by colonialism and their leaders' haircuts.

Speaking of invasive species, each time I try to biology, I find out that our plants are invasive too!

Behold the knobweed/false ironwort above, and the giant sensitive tree below. Knobby is "naturalized", whereas bashfulplant buddy is one of the world's top 100 nastiest invasive species. 

So no more speciesing. Let's find big leaves in the jungle.

It does rain in this climate.

In case you wondered why Bukit Brown cemetery is so undulating and eroded, go there during the rain.

The paths between the (1930s-60s) graves become drainage ditches.

It's quite refreshing. No one else goes, and you don't get too hot.

I think this is closer to Singapore's original state. You can see how they might not have found all of the unexploded bombs.

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