AFEC-X How wonderful,

While I was at XTBG I learnt that I was born in the year of the Dragon. Whether that is a good thing or not, I don’t really know.

Even if it is hard for anyone to imagine, I might be returning to XTBG later this year. Hope to feel the humid air again. Ride the tuk-tuk. Eat chicken feet and stay away from the rice-gin that kung fu panda cherished. But I might search for the late-night roasted potato of Yen Dinh and eat less rice and bamboo ‘things’. Spicy and happy!

Happy new year to everyone!!

To see pictures from Madagascar, just go to My media library. Enjoy!!!

Hi Afec-x

I am back from Madagascar. Yen, i didn’t interact with many mice though. I met a giant jumping rat. Endemic to Madagascar and critically endangered with a few thousand individuals left around kirindy forest where we were camped for most of the time. The wild life is amazing, 90% animals are endemic and you feel really lucky to see things like the Indri with less than a thousand individuals left alive. We spent almost an entire night watching the Fosa, Madagascar’s largest predatory cat, mate in the trees. Not pornographic, don’t worry. It’s a once in a lifetime treat.  The snakes are not venomous in this part of the world, save for one species. They were so many we almost adopted them as pets. I know you are not interested in words! words!! Pictures coming up!! But you can also visit me on face book, i have quite a few pics there as well.

Hey Nayana, and whoever is interested, check out this link for a Kinship fellowship in Washington.

http://www.kinshipfellows.org/go.php?page=howtoapply

Peter

In 2 days i will be on my way to Kirindy forest in Madagascar. I will arrive at the city of Antananarivo and then travel 2 days to Morondave region by bus. I will be attending the Tropical Biology Association course for this year, a version of AFEC-X. Once again, for a whole month i will be in those jungles and this time in an area that boasts of about 80% endemic species of plants and 90% endemic species of animals. I believe it will give me a different perspective on ecology and conservation issues and as expected build my capacity even better.

While I am there, I have been warned that the place is so isolated that there will be no access to phone calls or emails. We will only communicate with ourselves and with nature.  So it is only prudent that this time instead of learning the greetings in Chinese as before, we must learn monkey calls and bird greetings. Otherwise goodluck to all. Til then.

On my last day in China, i spent the night at Wu Kai’s uncle’ residence. Just after Dinner, he showed us around. He brought out his prize China and vases that were to me the most spectacular collection i had ever seen. There were those that were a few years old, and those that were hundreds of years old. And there was one that was dated back to a dynasty perhaps a thousand years ago. He said they had been passed on from generation to generation. I asked him how such delicate stuff could survive all the years of chaos that he probably went through; Wu kai and his little cousin running like mice all over the living room. His answer: If they want to stay here they stay here. If they want to get destroyed, they are destroyed.

I wish everybody surviving by the skin of their teeth in the sunamis, street riots, storms, and all the madness of nature the best of survival luck. I want to stay here atleast a little longer. I hope i will.

We are coming off a string of riots that paralyzed Uganda late last week. More than 20 lives were lost including a 14 year old shot while he hid in a kiosk on his way from school. Yen’s philosophy challenges my mind to ask why certain things happen the way they do.

I spent most of the day trapped indoors at our office. All i kept asking myself was why i had to go without lunch. Calm has been currently restored but i believe it is only temporal. Now the rain has come with some sort of veangance on hapless Ugandans. You should see it come down when it does.

Yen has started asking some tough questions about life. Why good people suffer and why people live or die, etc. Yen is thinking big thoughts lately.  But for me what is most important is the air i breath, the food i eat and the environment i live in.

Yen comes from a beautiful part of central Vietnam in Hanoi where the landscape is green and rains fall in time. There are plenty of fruits and food from the fertile hills she grew up climbing. And ever so once in a while she catches a glimpse of strange looking African immigrants who have come to Vietnam to cherish the wealth of this beautiful country. She is thousands of miles from the nearest desert or sites of natural habitat destruction. And yet Yen is wondering why people live or die. Why her good friend or relative suffers so often from debilitating illnesses.

Yen needs to find excitement in life by stepping out of her comfort zone and seeing the world a little bit just like Buddha did. She needs to appreciate the fact that we as human beings do not have much time to leave our foot marks on the sands of time. I envy Yen because she is going to experience the thrill of her lifetime. Good luck Yen! Good luck.

The idea of chicken feet has failed to catch here guys! I tried barbecuing some and my friends won’t even touch it. But the chopsticks are quite popular. You should see the Ugandan way of using it-A chopstick on each hand. Nayana, for all i know, you love children and i know why. Everybody, Nayana plans to have 5 sons.

My regards from the hills of southern Uganda. I wonder why southern places are always hilly and mountainous. Even South Vietnam has those grand hills that are famous for their unique vegetation cover. We are coming off a long drought here and the villages are stirring back to life as the rains return.

I returned to Kunming on Saturday and failed to check into a hotel because the 30days window given to me to stay in china had expired. Bhaktar discovered he had the same problem. A storm on Saturday grounded all flights to Thailand so somehow they told me it was ok. I was still pulled out of the queue though but with repeated warnings i was allowed to leave. And thus my 28-hour journey began. Wu Kai (Kevin) and Nana were amazing. These guys have big hearts, may Godspeed them. Kari and Loren, as usual, were present every step of the way and they lightened the illegal feeling somewhat!  In Uganda, i was picked at the airport and still had to travel another 6hours to get home, so i was in bed the whole of yesterday.

AFEC-X was to me the perfect package. I learned more in one month about frogs, spiders, genomics and ecology than any other previous month in my life. The approach was excellent too. The lectures supplemented with the intense field work were really good. At one moment a large snake was bursting out of the bushes and aiming for my ankle, and the other i was hugging bears and pausing with peacocks. I wouldn’t ask for more!

My thanks to Professors Chuck, Ferry and Rhet. Facilitators Matthew, Jeremy(Spiderman) and the whole gang.  My best wishes to Spiderman, he is a guy who truly loves to live. May you find what you are looking for. My thanks again to Kari, Nana, Wu Kai, Deng Wen, Luo Jie and everyone who went out of their way to make us free from worries.

And to Jer Pin. Composed, humble, good-natured, a true embodiment of the human soul. May you find the success you hope to achieve in your endeavors. Regards to everyone and keep in touch. I still think there is alot to debate about so lets comntinue doing so on the blog. Hey Navendu, write something!

For all of us attending this course, English is not a first language but today i witnessed something wickedly funny. I entered the EcologicalEvolution lab and saw this young scientist (AFEC-X participant) staring with the greatest concentration into a microscope. Underneath the lens was a tiny spider. There was light perspiration on his forehead as he struggled to analyze the specimen. Suddenly a smile broke out on his face and he nearly punched the air as he exclaimed. IT’S A BOY!!!