Victory For The Red Devils.....

The Red Devils won their first silverware in two years with a victory in the Carling Cup final yesterday. They romped to a 4-0 win (the biggest Carling Cup final victory in history) against Wigan with a sensational performance from Rooney. :O)

Picture from http://www.carlingcup.premiumtv.co.uk

The team also dedicated the win to Alan Smith who had dislocated an ankle and broke a leg last week and faces a lengthy spell on the sidelines, by wearing T-shirt with the words "For You, Smudge". :O)

Chek Jawa With Friends.....

Today was spent guiding my friends around Chek Jawa. As it is the Family Day, guides are allow to bring their family and friends to the place where they do volunteering guiding for the normal public.

I have invited three friends to come along to share with me the wonderful marine lives of Chek Jawa. And Alan finally makes it for this round as his honeymoon trip was postponed.

From L-R: Alan, Grace(Alan's wife) and Ernest(Alan's NS Buddy)

Today weather was great! Cloudy all the way! I guided them around and show them the marine lives on CJ. We saw quite a lot of things like three kinds of Sea Stars(Common, Sand and Knobby), a huge and two tiny Flatworms, Velcro Crab, Sponge Crab, and of course the usual sure can see stuffs like Anemones(Banded Bead, Carpet and Peacock), Sand Dollars, Ball Sea Cucumber and Cowries.

Just hope that they have enjoyed the trip. :O)

Disappointed.....

Felt disappointed with what is happening. :O/

Kind of upset with what I saw. :O/

Well.....reality bites with a bit of betrayal.

The Only One Left.....

Sad to say but it's true. Man Utd had only one chance left to put a silverware into their cabinet this season (Unless miracle happens in the Premiership, which I doubt).

They were out of the FA Cup last Saturday (Lost 1-0 to Liverpool). Actually, had already expected the outcome after seeing that Darren Fletcher and Kieran Richardson were on the first XI.

Now the only one left to win is the Carling Cup on 26th Feb against Wigan. Please don't slip up again. :O/

Splash For Trash.....

This passing weekend was spent cleaning up the beach and sea.

On Saturday, was at Ubin helping with the beach clean up. For more details, see Ubin Volunteers.

The next day was at Pulau Hantu diving for trashes. Signed up a Project AWARE with Seaborne Scuba last week. It was my first time doing cleaning underwater (No picture though as decided not to bring along the camera). We were doing the cleaning at the North Jetty (first time diving there too). The vis that day was GOOD! About 5m.

Each buddy pair was given a mesh bag each and down we went in search of rubbish littered over the reefs. Clearing rubbish underwater was not easy. We have to watch our buoyancy and also make sure that we are not dragging the mesh bag over the reefs, as it gets heavy. We have to make sure that we did not bring up any creatures living in/or growing on the discarded rubbish or take any that had embedded itself with the reefs. I was having a hard time pulling a piece of plastic bag out from that tonnes of slit. At the end of the first dive, we have collected some drink cans and cloths. During the dive, also managed to see a Blue Dragon nudibranch and a palm-size phyllidia varicosa.

Then something happened to me upon my ascend. My buddy said that my nose was bleeding. First thought to her was that I have suffered lung over-expansion (which is not because I am still here typing the blog away). :OP It was actually mucus with blood that still remain in my system from my recent flu. Think I may have blow my nose too hard during equalisation. What a scare!

Have the second dive after a thunderstorm. This time, we did a drift dive towards the jetty. However, the vis was not as good as with the first dive. It was about 2m. But still managed to catch sights of Blue Dragon nudibranchs mating, Cuttlefish, Groupers, Six-banded Angelfish and a school of Silver Moony at the jetty. And no nose bleed upon surfacing. :O)

More About Clouds.....

If you want to know more about clouds, go to this website:

The Cloud Appreciation Society

Sad, It's All Gone! :O(.....

My camera's storage card had a card error and now all my shots (movie and stills) of last Sunday fireworks were gone! :O(

Wonderful Diving At Pulau Hantu!.....

Today dive at Pulau Hantu was good. Saw a lot of creatures. :O)









Nudibranchs galore! Shown here are the blue dragon nudibranch, phyllidia nudibranchs (the white one was huge! It was about 8cm long and 3cm wide) and a pair of yellow coloured nudibranchs (about 1.5cm with blue rhinophores and gills). Also saw the Polka-dot nudibranch (jorunna funebris) but it was too small for my camera.


Flatworms : Saw two kinds but only managed to get this.





Crinoids : There were two today. The first one was hiding under a rock with two blue dragon nudibranchs nearby. The white one was quite small.


Icon Sea Star.

Caught a sight of a Shark’s tale (Opps! I mean tail) but never get to see the whole shark for it was hiding underneath a rock. Could it be a nurse shark???

Just as we were about to end the dive at noon, we happened to bump into someone who was already munching away its lunch. It’s a Hawksbill (correct me if I am wrong) and according to some of the divers, it could be the resident turtle. Despite surrounded by divers, it gave a Bo-chap attitude and continues munching.

Pulau Hantu Tomorrow.....

Managed to get a last minute dive trip to Pulau Hantu tomorrow. :o)

Will be back on mainland at about 1.30pm and have an appointment with Alyce to check out spiders on Pulau Ubin at 3.30pm. Guess I will be rushing like mad tomorrow.

If not, I won't be able to dive for the rest of February weekends due to other commitments.

Blackburn Rovers 4 Man Utd 3.....

Need I say more? Sigh..... :O/ The Premiership is Chelsea for sure now.

Just hope they don't slip up in the final of the Carling Cup on 26th Feb and do well in the FA Cup (that mean they have to beat Liverpool on 18th Feb first).

Guess the new engine room won't be in until next season since the transfer window had closed.

Lunar New Year Visits.....

While most people were visiting their friends and relatives during the festive season, I was out at our shores visiting our marine creatures.

On the first day of the Lunar New Year, we went to Pulau Sekudu. It is a small island located near the southeastern part of Pulau Ubin. Managed to see quite a few things including the two types of nudibranch below. The one with blue spots is a dendrodoris denisoni but had no idea the identity for the red one. Perhaps this is the Ang Bao given by Mother Nature to us for the Lunar New Year. :O)

On the second day, we were at Pulau Hantu. It has been a while since I last visited the intertidal there. Saw a Pipefish, flatworms, nudibranchs (discodoris boholensis) and found a frogfish under a rock. And it was the first time I seen a frogfish stalking its prey and engulf the fish in action! COOL!!!( For more details, see Wildfilms Blog )

We went to St John's Island on the third day. Since I was the only filmcrew, I was doing the shooting. Mainly taking landscape shots. There were lots of nudibranch (jorunna funebris were everywhere and a tiny one that look like a gymnodoris) and flatworms! But the find of the day for me was two sea slugs that look like part of a brown seaweed (sargassum). A check on the Seaslug Forum, the nearer images i can find are these, a crosslandia daedali or a brown colour version of a crosslandia viridis .

And guess what? We even have fire works for our ending of our Lunar New Year visits. While waiting at the jetty for our boat, we managed to catch the fire works display for the River Hongbao.