Archive for the 'earth' Category

love ‘em sea turtles!

Published on August 3, 2009 in earth, friends, hobbies and stuff. 13 Comments Tags: , , , .

Weekend was a bliss. Good companies, great activities, plenty of sea turtles — what more can a girl ask for right?

Thanks to the ever-so-lovely-and-wonderful-plus-HOT Mrs Rena Cullen, I get to tag along with her to join the Biodiversity Camp 2009 held at Pantai Kerachut over the weekend. It was a blast!! Pantai Kerachut is one of the few beaches in Malaysia where sea turtles are still coming up to shore to lay eggs. So, what better place to organize such camp? :D

Well, in most cases, one would hike in to Pantai Kerachut. Again, thanks to the ever-so-lovely-and-wonderful-plus-HOT Mrs Rena Cullen, we get to take the boat in. For a moment, it appears to be one good choice, until we leave the pier that is. It was raining cats and dogs since morning. Hence, the sea was so choppy and the waves were crazy I thought we weren’t gonna make it. We did arrive (thank God), 45 mins later. It should have been a 20-min boat-ride! *gulp*. Nevertheless, we survived.

The campsite at Pantai Kerachut looks pretty cool. With a kitchen, tables and benches, it can fit 30 tents and probably more. Love the campsite.

campsite

After putting our bags in the tent, we went on to the turtle conservation center to listen to a talk about sea turtles. As much as I love turtles, there are certain facts that I still didn’t know. Some facts were so shocking that I was dumbfounded, standing at the back of the crowd, bitting my fingers (yes, check out the pic at the bottom right corner).

talk

So, here are some of the facts.

DO YOU KNOW THAT,

  • sea turtles have existed in the face of the Earth for tons of years and have outlived the dinosaurs!
  • sea turtles are going into extinction, especially the big leatherback turtles.
  • only 1 out of 1000 baby sea turtles survive to become an adult — the amount of predators around these baby turtles are just too many!
  • sea turtles reach adulthood at the age of 30.
  • mummy turtles don’t go into menopause — they lay eggs for as long as they live.
  • humans are killing sea turtles for their flesh coz it is said to be filled with nutrition. eggs are being eaten as well. the carcass are used for decorations — (damn us humans).
  • sea turtles have great eye sight when they’re underwater but when they come up shore, they become short-sighted.
  • sea turtles are sensitive — they don’t like to have spotlight shining at them, disturbing them, especially when they’re laying eggs.

…and there are many other facts that is really an eye-opening exprience for everyone who’s present.

After the talk, it was lunchtime before the next event at 2pm. That leaves us with plenty of time to check out Pantai Kerachut, even after lunch. There’s a Meromictic Lake at the end of the beach. In turns out that there are only 19 of this type of lake in the world, and Pantai Kerachut happens to have one of them. A meromictic lake is a lake which has layers of water that do not intermix; sea and river water. Sea water having higher density stays at the bottom while the river water stays at the top. Cool huh?

meromictic

We didn’t have such luck to see that lake coz the water in the lake has all dried up. What we see is just an empty land where the lake was supposed to be. We, however, got drenched wet instead — head to toe. It started pouring before we could get back to camp. It was a long run back to camp. It’s not all that easy to run on sand in that heavy rain, so we decided to take shelter at the rangers’ hut to let the rain subside a little before heading back to camp.

We manage to get back to camp, drenched wet, and by then, it was close to 2pm. From then on, it was plain boring. The rain continued to pour after stopping for probably 30 minutes or so. The VIP couldn’t get into Pantai Kerachut due to heavy rain and the wind and sea waves were just too big.

So we waited and waited and waited and waited until it was approximately 4.30pm or so. Gosh. But guess what? The wait was most worth it. Worth every single bit of it.

:)

After the launching of the hatchery place by the VIPs and the handing-over-of-cheque ceremony to the turtle conservation centre representative, the moment we’ve been waiting for finally arrived — the release of the mother turtle and baby turtles!! :D

mama-turtle

pretty-mama

The mummy turtle was released first. I was most moved by how after the helpers helped the mummy turtle out of the big basin, they held hands and walked behind the turtle, forming a semi-circle. It was like this big emo send off, making sure that she got back to sea safely. I was moved. A transmitter is attached to her shell so it would be easier for them to track her down. Oh, and btw, I think she’s absolutely gorgeous.

Everyone cheered after she was sent off safely. Woohooo! Next up, BABY TURTLES! :D

baby-turtles

The baby turtles are the cutest little thing. I think there were approximately hundred plus turtles that were released that day. Can you spot some of them who went belly up? It was so funny! There were small pit holes all around and some of them just fell into the pit hole. We had to go save some of them. Some went the wrong way! I picked up a few and turn them around, so they would be moving towards the sea. Absolutely cute!

What’s moving is watching how determined these little dudes and dudettes were to get back to sea. Most of them, after moving a few inches, would have to stop to catch their breath. That so-to-speak short distance from the beach to sea for us is one hell of a long distance for those baby turtles. But not one of them gave up. All of them made it back to sea eventually. Yay you baby turtles! :)

The best part is I get to hold one of them! :D I even gave him a kiss. Like literally! *muacks*

meturtle

babyturtlebig

See, he’s waving. *wave*. Yay! I’m praying for him to survive the lost years and turn adult in 30 years.

I am happy to have the opportunity to experience this. I have always loved turtles and to be able to help them to at least get back to sea feels great. I just hope they survive. Btw, this species that we were helping are green turtles.

Thank you once again, Mrs Rena Cullen. Due to the bad weather, by the time Mrs Rena Cullen got back, the turtles have left. :(

renacullen

…and here you have her waving from the boat. *wave*

Oh, and many thanks to you-know-who-you-are who took all these pics. Most lovely is what these pics are. :D

LOVE ‘EM SEA TURTLES!

Happy Earth Day 2009

Published on April 22, 2009 in earth, events and me. 6 Comments Tags: , .

earth-day

This may appear to be a little too late, but Happy Earth Day 2009. I was watching a documentary about how Earth is being destroyed by humans on HBO. Although it is not as sentimentally moving as the Inconvenient Truth, but it is good enough of a documentary to show how we are destroying Earth without realizing it. Sad, but true. *sigh*.

I cannot help but wonder why the hype for this Earth Day is not as strong as the hype for 60 Earth Hour. It is afterall, pretty much of the same thing. In fact, Earth Hour is actually a subset of Earth Day.

Oh well, remember to love mother nature. Happy Earth Day.

saving Earth in the most ridiculous way

Published on April 2, 2009 in earth, people and thoughts. 2 Comments Tags: , , .

I am sure we are all aware of the fact that the Earth is regenerating resources at a rate which is not fast enough to sustain the current human lifestyle. We are literally killing ourselves at this very moment. I know that many of us are trying their very best to save mother Earth — recycling, saving energy, using environmental friendly products, etc. However, some of us have actually gone overboard, coming out with rather ridiculous way of saving mother Earth. At least it’s ridiculous from how I see it.

Here’s the story. I was driving to work one day listening to hitz.fm and it was days before Earth Hour. Hence, a lot of topics were somewhat related to saving the Earth and environment. The DJs were talking about a lady who refuses to travel by plane, simply coz she didn’t want to contribute to the amount of carbon that has been emitted into Earth. She was suppose to fly to Australia from England to attend her friend’s wedding. Now, because she refuses to travel by plane, she started her journey approximately 3 months before the day of her friend’s wedding. Yes, 3 months. She traveled, generally by sea and land — cars, horses, ship I suppose (I don’t quite remember) and the list pretty much goes on. Apparently, this was supposed to save on carbon emission, hence saving on global warming.

Now, let us use the carbon footprint calculator. Total amount of carbon emission contributed by one person, flying from England to Australia and back would amount up to approximately 3 tonnes. Spending 3 months on the road, staying in places and using up a certain amount of electricity, MAY just caused the same amount of CO2 being emitted into Earth. Who knows, it could have been more. I may be wrong, but I just felt that this method is ridiculous simply because you are throwing away 3 months trying to save Earth, when you could have been causing more damage! In fact, one can use 3 months to do wonders, including things that could save Earth. 3 tonnes of CO2 is a lot. I’m not denying that fact. But couldn’t there be a more efficient way of saving Earth rather than spending 3 months of our time traveling by feet?

Yes, our lifestyle has changed. It is an evolution in the humankind. There is no way we can go back to living in the ancient world where we hunt for our own food and cook them under a fire we built by rubbing two stones together. Yes, the evolution has caused us humans to consume resources from the Earth at a rate that is way too fast for the Earth to regenerate. But spending 3 months trying to get to another place does not seem to be efficient in terms of energy consumed either. I think it’s just someone trying to clear his or her conscious by traveling by land or sea. Coz it doesn’t make any much sense at all.

Let’s look from the perspective of what I’ll do on Monday. I’ll be flying from Penang to HongKong for business and me alone would have caused approximately 0.6 tonnes of CO2 to be emitted into Earth. If traveling by land and sea will really save Earth, would that mean that I have to start my journey a month earlier and waste a month of time, not being able to do work efficiently? I just don’t see the point — at all. In addition to all of that, has anyone actually thought of how much money would be needed to travel that way? Is it really cheaper? Think about the amount of time needed. Really, is it any cheaper? Not everyone has that luxury of spending that sort of money to save Earth. It’s the same as those who can afford fuel efficient cars and start to criticize ppl who aren’t using fuel efficient cars. Not everyone is able to afford that.

Why not we start out the thought of saving Earth by thinking about how we can save the amount of household or work electricity that we may have wasted daily. Hmm? Or why not we start by effectively doing recycling activities, starting from home. Hmm? Wouldn’t that seemed a little wiser?

I’m all against global warming. I know global warming is killing us. But even though we are trying to save Earth, I still believe we should do it wisely and efficiently. I don’t believe that going back to living like a caveman would help — seriously.

Then again, this are just my thoughts. You are free to disagree.

drowning polar

Published on March 28, 2009 in earth, life and news. 6 Comments Tags: , , , .

Thanks to the increase of global temperature, polar bears up north are drowning.

Ice are melting. The bears have got no place to go.

Some say humans have got nothing to do with this – humans are not responsible for global warming. Some who lives at the North Pole (probably next to Santa) say the claims by environmentalist and a part of the society that ice is depleting is all bullshit. There are more polar bears to go around for everyone than it has been many years ago.

If it is a bunch of crap and all this claims are wrong, can someone explain this video footage? :(

Drowning polars are just one of the many result from global warming.

Tell me, how can you not save these cute polar bears?

p/s: If you are planning to participate in Earth Hour, it means that you are VOTING to FIGHT GLOBAL WARMING. Hence, it’s not just about turning off your lights for that ONE HOUR. ONE HOUR doesn’t mean anything. Try calculating your carbon footprint and see how much you’re actually contributing to this climate change. If you’re not going to try and ease those carbon emission in the future,  pls don’t turn off your lights tonight. It wouldn’t make much of a difference. You’re just giving ppl who wants to save mother Earth false hope.

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