17 Dec 2024 - The World of Studio Ghibli Exhibition

Jerlene's school holiday has started and we brought her to Art Science Museum for the World of Studio Ghibli Exhibition as promised.  Javier was not interested with Japanese Anime and did not come along.  Right outside of Art Science Museum, we saw one theatrical set from the movie "Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea".  In this aquatic fantasy, a fish named Ponyo falls in love with a human and brings about a miracle.

As we had already purchased the tickets online, we skipped the ticketing counter on B2 and went straight to the Exhibition on Level 3.  The first area of the exhibition hall features movies from "Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind" and "The Boy and the Heron".  We did not watch both of these movies but Nausicaa was a masterpiece which led to the birth of Studio Ghibli.

The next exhibit is "Porco Rosso", a film that set in the Adriatic Sea of the 1920s, during the tumultuous aftermath of World War I and the rise of Fascism.

Following is the theatrical set from "Pom Poko".  It's about a story of modern tanuki struggling to survive the destruction of their natural habitat.

"Prince Mononoke" (below) is a profound, majestic historical fantasy depicting the clash between gods and humans, nature and civilization.

The next exhibit is from the movie "Kiki's Delivery Service".  Kiki struggles to become a full-fledged witch in Studio Ghibli's first major hit.

Finally, we arrived at the section featuring our favourite movie "Spirited Away", in which a strange land waits on the other side of a tunnel.

At the end of the exhibit, we had the opportunity to take photos with "No-face", a special character in the movie.  He is shown to be capable of reacting to emotions and ingesting other individuals in order to gain their personality and physical traits.  There was a short queue before our turn to take following photos.

After completing our visit on Level 3 of the Exhibition, we realized there were more exhibits on B2 Galleries.  In fact, we should start our visit on B2 Galleries before Level 3.  No wonder before exiting Level 3, we got to go through a souvenir shop.

We continued our visit at B2 Galleries and the first theatrical set was from the movie "Howl's Moving Castle".  This movie is about a strange tale of the love between a handsome wizard and an elderly woman.

We moved on to the next exhibit featuring the movie "Castle in the Sky", Studio Ghibli's first official feature film about an original high-spirited airborne action-adventure story.

The last exhibit on B2 Galleries is none other than "My Neighbour Totoro", a fantasy story about two children and the mysterious forest spirits that they encounter.

We queued for about half an hour in order to take the following photos with Totoro!  Cheese!

This marked the end of our visit to The World of Studio Ghibli Exhibition at Art Science Centre.

14 Dec 2024 - Nice Cloud Formation

Took this photo while on the way to work.

4 Dec 2024 - National Olympiad in Informatics (NOI) Training

Early this morning, I sent Javier to NUS School of Computing (SoC) where he will be attending NOI training in the month of December.  There are a total of 10 full day lessons, every Mon, Wed and Sat.  This training is fully subsidized by TJC.  Really admire Javier's energy and he's always so busy during his school holidays.  I guess when you are interested with something, you will not feel tired.  :-)

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To be updated.....

25 Nov 2024 - Edusave Certificate of Academic Achievement 2024

Another year, another award for his academic achievement.  Congratulations to Javier!  Well done!

24 Nov 2024 - Walking Trails at Lower Peirce Reservoir Park

We went for an early morning walk at Lower Peirce Reservoir Park today.  It's located not far away from Thomson Nature Park which we explored 2 weeks ago.

Lower Peirce Reservoir's history dates back to 1910 when it was impounded as the Kallang River Reservoir. Later renamed Peirce Reservoir in honor of Robert Peirce, a former municipal engineer, the reservoir has witnessed the transformation of Singapore's landscape.

As we walked towards the boardwalk trails, we noticed some red patches on the rocks.  I did a search on the internet and realized these were actually snail eggs.  

The large egg clusters belong to an invasive snail species known as the golden apple snail.  More than a month ago, large amounts of such invasive snail eggs were spotted in Lower Seletar Reservoir.  While the eggs do not affect the water quality of the reservoirs, PUB and the National Parks Board (NParks) regularly remove these eggs as part of their maintenance works in nature areas and reservoirs.

No wonder I saw many snail shells on the nearby grass patches.

Lower Peirce Reservoir Park, which nestled along Old Upper Thomson Road, is a 10-hectare park and home to a mature secondary rainforest.

There are several trails in this park, and we intended to cover all of them.

This is the main entrance that leads to the boardwalk that winds through the lush greenery.

The 900-meter boardwalk provides stunning views of the reservoir and offers opportunities for wildlife spotting.

This part of the boardwalk can be quite slippery, especially after rain.  So be extra careful, otherwise one may accidentally slip into the shallow water as there is no railing.

The boardwalk continued into the dense rainforest.

Can you spot anything in the following photo?  It's right in the middle.

It's a rare Lesser Mousedeer.  This is our first time spotting a mousedeer in the wild.  Watch the video at the end of this post to have a closer look at this beautiful mammal.

We then followed the boardwalk which led us to another trail.

The trail led us to the Casuarina Entrance along Old Upper Thomson Road.

Our plan was to walk along the road towards another Jacaranda Entrance which brought us back into the rainforest.

We saw quite a number of wildlife along this trail, in particular a Plantain Squirrel and ......

Yet another Lesser Mousedeer!  Spotting it once is considered lucky, spotting it twice is unimaginable!  Woohoo!

We slowly walked back to the reservoir while encountering a diverse range of plants.

Fun fact:  The source of the Kallang River, Singapore's longest river, is the Lower Peirce Reservoir.

The river flows for approximately 10 kilometers from the Lower Peirce Reservoir to its mouth at the Kallang Basin, near the Merdeka Bridge.  Along its journey, it passes through various neighborhoods including Ang Mo Kio, Bishan, Toa Payoh, and Geylang Bahru.  In the photo below, the reservoir is on the right, and Kallang River is on the left.

Enjoy the following video which features the rare Lesser Mousedeer, Plantain Squirrel, Long-tailed Macaques and more...

19 Nov 2024 - False Parasol Mushrooms

As Javier and I were walking home after our lunch, we saw several huge mushrooms on the grass by the pavement.  They appear to be Chlorophyllum Molybdites, commonly known as False Parasol Mushrooms or Green-Spored Lepiota.  While Chlorophyllum Molybdites are not deadly poisonous, they can cause severe gastrointestinal distress, including nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.