I dare to bring up the fact that most of us admit our dislike for or impatience with children. Not all kids in general, but usually the screaming, whining, spoilt little ones, or irritable (and sometimes irritating) teens. Of course, I know that this ‘dislike’ or ‘impatience’ is seldom displayed during a ReefWalk because we know better than to let our personal likes/dislikes/biases get in the way when we’re supposed to be spreading inspiring messages to the public. Here’s my 2 cents’ worth…

The Future Is Ours To Make. Remember images of happy, smiling children, and teens dancing with Taufik & Rui En permeating our everyday lives a few months back (no excuse… if you didn’t see it while watching TV at home, you would have seen it on TV Mobile – in the bus, at the MRT station, in the train, on big screen displays on buildings…)? It kinda gave people the impression that the statement “The future is ours to make” comes from children. But that’s not exactly right. As adults in the here & now, we are the present, and the future is OURS to make, or break, FOR the children.

We can continue living our selfish, self-absorbed lives and not leave anything behind. Here, I’m not talking abt leaving enough kids behind to avoid a greying population. Neither am I talking abt conserving what we still have for future generations. These are all issues that have been highlighted too many times already.

I’m talking abt leaving the Message behind. Making your mark, and making sure it’s set in stone, or more like set in the hearts & minds of the young, who will carry this Message like a torch to enlighten others. So when you say the FUTURE is ours to make, it actually means that the PEOPLE of the future are ours to mould. And this starts with how we connect with and inspire the children of Today.

If a child leaves a ReefWalk feeling that Kusu is not worth conserving ‘cos it’s all mud & smells like crap, remember, this little ‘brat’ will one day be the Man of Tomorrow.

The kids that scream & complain the most may one day be the Voice of the future or an important decision maker, given their ‘skilled’ vocals & power to communicate. What message do you want this kid to carry forward?

Why is the sea blue over there? Why is it brown over here? How come the anemone dun have Nemo? Why does the barnacle wanna stay on the rock? But why? But why? The overly curious kid that you wish you could whack with your pot or guidebook may one day be an environmental journalist or researcher. What would be this child’s inspiration in the future?

And don’t think the little tantrum-throwing cry baby is just too pampered or overly dramatic. Maybe one day become big time celebrity or Ah Jie leh… What cause would you like an Ah Jie or Heavenly King to stand up for?

So don’t bully them. Don’t talk down to them. Don’t give them the evil eye. Don’t instill fear. How well you manage to attract, interest, interact, and above all else, inspire a child, may be just what he/she needs to kickstart a lifelong passion and love for nature. The children who come for ReefWalks are our true VIPs. They are the ones who will say, “Papa, please don’t order shark’s fin soup anymore”. And ‘Papa’ will listen to his child more than to his wife. They are the ones who will insist, “Mummy, I don’t want to learn ballet. I want to know more about corals.” And ‘Mummy’ will still send little one off to ballet class, but probably also find a way for her to study corals. Parents will do almost anything to give their kids a good future. And so should we.

Children’s Day isn’t just a day for kids. It’s for all those who are role models in their lives – parents, teachers, mentors, guides. We must also remember that we were once kids, and realise that that kid is still very much a part of who we are. From the way we walk & talk, live & breathe. We still stumble & fall. We still complain & whine at times. We still get excited over trivial things & ask many questions. Nobody’s perfect. Young or old.

I don’t wanna sound like Whitney Houston, but the children are the future. Little minds longing for knowledge. Little hearts longing for direction. Little souls longing for inspiration.

We can either make ‘em, or break ‘em.

It is a dark and quiet night. A full and yellow moon rises above, lighting up the lonely streets of Changi.

Authorities thought they had done a good job of ‘cleaning’ Changi of its late night ‘workers’, but here, a Lady of the Night appears, dressed in her best ‘work’ attire. She scours the area, looking for the perfect catch. And then, the action begins…..

“Oh, Alfie! So big!” — “Wah! Your thing is so long!” — “Oi, Sayang, don’t go in, go out so much lah… I’m in a very uncomfortable position” — “Oh, yeah… that’s good! Do that again…yeah…”

Changi - Just Come Once and You’ll Be Begging for More.

Now let me introduce you my handsome model, Alfie, better known as an Alpheus shrimp. Here’s Alfie posing with his BIG claw and LONG feelers:

And Alfie again, DOING what he does best:

This snapping shrimp entertained me while I was waiting for the tide to go out. He just kept on going, IN and OUT of his burrow, digging, picking bits of shells and stones, decorating his ‘home’. If I had extra camera batteries and like 10 gigs of memory on card, and if I didn’t get a major leg cramp from squatting in an awkward position on the shore for so long, I probably would have made a ‘low budget’ movie out of it. Heh heh…

This blog was actually written a couple of months back but I was saving it for a ‘lull period’ when we had nothing to Klog. Sorry for the ‘RA’ bit at the start! Had to get your attention right? So some of these shots were taken EARLY this morning, and some, on another morning when I was supposed to be ‘somewhere else’ instead of here on a beach, getting excited over little Penaeuses and friends.

Penaeus sp.

So apart from these prawny guys, crabs of all sizes, colours and disguises scurried about. Unfortunately, most of my pictures came out rather blurred; Lack of sleep & food = shaky hands. Got a whole lotta hermit crabs and other dudes up to some hanky panky on the beach too, but I’ll save that for another korny Klog

The original plan for my visit to Changi Beach was to study seaweed and seagrass ‘cos I feel nobody appreciates how useful these are, and how bare, boring and barren the shore would be without them. But I got distracted by so many other dudes!

Moon Snail

Sand Collar (eggs of Moon Snail)
See how it really does look like a collar! With the ’shoulder’ part to the left & right, and a sort of Nehru collar shape there.

Small jelly-like anemone like these can be spotted all over the shore.

Curly-wurly branching anemone

Buttons…

And more buttons!

Now is it just me, or are you guys just really happy to see me?

Seapen with feathery bits retracted

This mollusc questions the meaning of life…

At one point, I was kneeling in a huge puddle of water enclosed by a bed of sea lettuce ‘cos 3 different fishes seemed to be congregating at the same spot… like 3 uncles who go to the kopitiam every morning for their daily dose of kopi, kaya toast and gossip.

Introducing ‘kopitiam uncle’ number one — Kite Butterflyfish! He looked rather beaten up, colours faded, fins chewed off a bit. This was more like “brudder” lah. He just stayed there, relek, ‘tangkap jambu’…

Then, ‘kopitiam uncle’ number two — Fan-bellied Filefish! This was one busy fella, like the actual kopi guy, darting about from one end to another end and back again. So cute… he actually swims at an angle, with his body slanted about 30 degrees to the left or right. Looked more like he was floating in a lopsided way. He just swam all around me, even right next to my booties.

And of course, all ‘kopitiam’ gangs must have their resident ’spy’ a.k.a. kaypoh — juvenile Peacock Sole! You can’t see him but he can see you! Like those ‘chi-ko-peks’ that hide behind the void deck pillar while watching you adjust your bra strap or eavesdrops while you chit chat with the neighbour.

Here’s a little more info about Butterflyfish. Butterflyfish get their name because of the way they swim in and out of coral structures, like butterflies dancing around a flower. So I guess the Kite Butterflyfish looks like a kite drifting around clouds?

While most other fishes believe that there truly are “so many fish in the sea” and have multiple mating partners, Butterflyfish are perfect examples of commitment as they’re said to form male-female pairs, mate for life and are rarely seen apart from each other. Butterflyfish stick to their “in sickness and in health, till death do us part” vows, and remain together until either one falls prey to a predator. Awww… so sweet! Now if only men were………………….

*forcing head out of clouds* Okay! Back to reality. So anyway, no low tide trip to the shore is complete without things that make you go Ooh…

Wuhdat?

Underside of half of a dead jellyfish. oOoooh…

Okay, I’ll have to save all the other pictures for yet another blog entry ‘cos this one’s getting too heavy! There were also many other little fishes and crabs that were too fast for me or too small for little cam. Now if I had a D70… *head floating in clouds again*

If I did make that ‘low budget’ movie, it would probably end like this:

CAMERA: ZOOM IN. Pair of Butterflyfish swim together around brightly coloured corals and sponges.

MUSIC: FADE UP “… up to the moment when we said our first Hello, little did we know, love was just a glance away, a warm embracing dance away, and ever since that night, we’ve been together…” THEN FADE UNDER.

CAMERA: ZOOM OUT. Tilt up slowly for full view of sunrise on horizon, and white clouds against clear blue skies.

ROLL CREDITS.

“… It turned out so right, for strangers in the night” – Frank Sinatra

PS. I’m still compiling my seaweed & seagrass ‘portfolio’ and will present it some other day. Time for Lady of the Night to call it a day. :o)

We go, rain or shine. This is one of the many reminders that we send to our Reefwalk participants prior to a walk. And so it was, on a cold, dark and wet Sunday morning, that 125 eager participants set off in the rain to explore the intertidal on Kusu. This was the largest group of participants we’ve brought out so far, thanks to the good response from more volunteers stepping forward to guide. Bluebird was on the lookout for the slightest hint of lightning, ready to blow the whistle and call off the walk if the weather got too bad. As this was my first time co-ordinating a Reefwalk, I felt that good ol’ ‘Murphy’ was really being a pain in the ***. Luckily, the bad weather didn’t persist and silver linings soon appeared around fluffy white clouds.

As Floggie mentioned, the downpour not only caused many of the creatures to go into hiding, it kinda mucked up the water quite a bit. But there were still many pleasant surprises in store for us.

Apart from the knobbly sea star and flathead discovered at the sea lagoon, one of our keen-eyed participants also spotted a stonefish! Phew! Thank goodness it wasn’t me leading that group or I probably would have stepped on it, and be posting a very different Klog from a hospital bed right now! Unfortunately I didn’t get to see it in the flesh, but Bluebird has a really cool pic of it that I hope he’ll upload soon. No sand dollars? I think Floggie went to the wrong bank. Not only were some of us ‘paid’ with sand dollars, we even had lots of coin seaweed (Halimeda) for spare change!

Over at the temple lagoon, we had other interesting dudes waiting for us – a scorpion fish, peanut worm and an octopus! Unfortunately, the octopus was dead when I found it but we thought it was alive ‘cos it was still changing colours. I guess it was physically dead but its pigment cells (chromatophores) were still active for a while. The poor sad guy just lay out of the water, his legs sprawled around a rock and head kinda squished between other rocks. Some male octopuses die immediately after mating, so I’m hoping that this was a male, and that this was his cause of death rather than anything else.

Note to Floggie: You missed out on ‘breakfast’ at the temple lagoon. Sausages and grapes aplenty! They were all over the rocky shore. Sausage seaweed (or what I personally call the green ‘tau-geh’ seaweed) and sea grapes. And these sea grapes weren’t the usual Caulerpa lentillifera that we’ve seen and ‘tried’ on Sentosa. These were the larger, juicy ones that look like enoki or buna hon-shimeji mushrooms, Caulerpa racemosa. Yihao and group even spotted a moray eel here! Unagi and green enoki for breakfast?

When the rain stopped and night turned to day, we were greeted by the usual sound of snapping shrimps, busy popping away, and the sight of purple climber crabs scurrying about the rock bunds. Later I found a cute big eyed fish (not Nan), stranded on the rocky shore. He was put in a tank to recover from being left out of water and later identified by Bluebird as a glass perchlet. After a little show & tell for some participants, little big eyed fish was set back into the big blue sea to look for his other little big eyed fish friends :o)

At the start of the walk, everyone, participants, guides and trainees included, were undoubtedly a little apprehensive about the heavy downpour. But by daylight and the end of the walk, I could see that everyone just didn’t want it to end. Looking cold, wet and tired, a few groups still went on and on. The tide came in pretty quickly, so these few gung-ho groups switched lagoons and explored further up shore.

Hair all wet from the rain, this little sweetheart still looks so adorable! Look at how she stares at the sea star so lovingly:

As co co-ordinator, moving from lagoon to lagoon, I got to see and listen to how other guides conduct their walks, and I must say I feel I’ve done my previous groups of participants a huge injustice with my cannot-make-it guiding ‘skills’. Now I know that even though we don’t have a really big pool of volunteer guides, our team of guides may be small, but they’re really A-class man! Here’s me doing my Wayne’s World kow-tow to you – I’m not worthy! I’m not worthy! Each of you have your different style and approach to guiding, but by the way the participants hang on to your every word, I feel I’ve got a long way to go to get an ‘A’ too. Must read up more and practise my lines with the neighbourhood cats and mini mart aunty downstairs.

Jani explains how sea stars ‘do it’:

Zee gives a large group of participants (including me!) a Bio 101 on the octopus:

After the walk, most of the participants wandered around the island while waiting for the ferry.

If you took some time to appreciate the ‘finer’ things in life, you would soon discover that everything around you has art and beauty written all over it - even weeds and slugs.

When all the participants and guides left on the first ferry out, Bluebird finally got the threesome he’s been hinting about the past few weeks:

Though, not exactly the way he had imagined.

Bluebird, Pammy Whammy and I kind of became invertebrates for a while and spent most of the rest of the morning slumped in our hammocks. But these two slept for hours! It started to rain again, and soon it was storming and we sat in our hammocks, pigging out on leftover food and dark chocolate. Pammy left Bluebird and I in stitches with her “tee-ti-tit” song. I laughed till I had tears in my eyes!

What I learnt this weekend: Yihao loves that last cup of coffee at around 11pm every night like me. Soh was stung by a stonefish on East Coast once. Pammy, Bluebird and I know the words to Bed of Roses. Don’t talk too much to Bluebird in the morning or when he’s driving. How to tie a hammock properly (and not to hang mozzie coil on it the ‘Jani’ way!). Papa Jeff can ‘show’ you the meaning of endurance. And finally, not only can we ‘do it’ in the dark or in broad daylight, we do it rain or shine!

“Love can build a bridge, Between your heart and mine.
It all depends on you and me, Now is the time”

Yes, the volcano barnacles (Tetraclita sp) were singing away as 125 participants, both young and matured, and scores of reef guides and OJTs were there early this morning for the reef walk event.

For us, the day started rather earlier than usual. I was awake at 3am and by 4 am was at the bus stop before the Sentosa bridge. Though the participants were advised to be there between 4.15 to 4.45, many, like Sherlee were just too excited to take that extra wink! So we were there under the starlights.

The walk started before dawn, and though it rained, it did not dampen the spirits of the enthusiastic participants and equally committed guides and OJTs. Those that had ponchos put them on and those without, proceeded without!

Let me introduce you to Group 3S (Irene, Margaret, Ju Hiang, Dora, Annie, Janice Daniel, Voon, Hongzheng & Kok Siang)

As you can see, many were prepared and well equipped with torches and we proceeded directly into the rain onto the beach. First stop, the star of the reefs. The common sea stars (Archaster typicus) and they were busy doing their fair share in re-producing future generations of sea stars for next year’s reef walks….And we shall not disturb them for sadly, they are no longer common on our shores.

Did I mention next year? Yes, this will be the the last large publicly organised reef walk for this year, but we guides and trainees will continue to train, and we will continue to klog on our activities.

As dawn approached, we were able to see more activites, though as Papa Jeff said, it was harder to spot the marine life this morning and this could be because of the rain and/or low tide. Besides the corals, sea weeds, sea grass, sea fan, sponges and usual marine life like hermit crabs, we did see an occasional swimming crab and many ornate goby (Istigobius ornatus). Yong Xiang wanted very much to show the group the sea grapes (Caulerpa racemosa) and sea sausage seaweed (Neomeris sp), but I guess its out of season. And we were at the sand bank, but there were no sand dollars to be found. With no certainty, I thought we also saw the Indian flathead (Platycephalus indicus) at the shallows.

The Knobbly sea star (Protoreaster nodosus) stole the limelight for this morning as they are not that common at Kusu. Did any guide from Chek Jawa bring it over?

It was a wonderful experience and we like to believe that we have helped the 125 participants to build a bridge between their hearts and the marine life. The future of nature all depends on you and me. And now is the time to understand how fragile nature is if we want future generations to be able to appreciate them as we did this morning.