Thiania bhamoensis - Jumping Leaf Spider

This jumping spider was once popular during my primary school. It is known as Thiania bhamoensis and can be found in South East Asia. Its fighting ability(males) when meeting each other was the reason why we rear them as pet and compete for 'first king' status.



It is easy to distinguish between the male and female. The frontal view of the male is white while the female is black.


Male

Female

This eight legged arachnid lives between two leaves after binding them together with vertical strand of silken retreats. They can be found on many kind of plants and I prefer to find them on the spider lily leaves.


The size of this spider is barely bigger that our thumb nail.

The fight can be brief to a couple of minutes long. Typically, it started off with a dancing act of the two males showing off like a scorpion posture with the butt bent to one side and slowly approaching each other. Once they meet, both males will extend their frontal legs and mandible to push or sparring against each other. The fight ended with the retreat of the weaker one.





I came across a forum mentioning some rare males show no interest to fight. This type of male spider seldom display the dancing act and only interest to attack and kill. It may just rush to its opponent, grab and try its luck to bite the weak side of its opponent body i.e abdomen.


It is tricky to catch this tiny creature as it is agile and will leap away swiftly when senses threat. With patient and skill, this will not post a big problem to catch them. Each spider is kept in a well ventilated container with some fresh leaves for this spider to build a home. Ensure dripping some fresh water droplets for the spider to drink as it gets thirsty easily.


It will hunt for life insect smaller that its size i.e mosquito. It can be fooled easily with dead insect as meal by dropping them into its home. Once this spider is comfortable, it will not leap away as crazy as it did during the catch.

From top view, the thorax of the spider exhibit various colours. The colour that I came across was green, blue and to the rarer ones, black. It was a common belief that the black males are the most aggressive.


When the male meet its opposite sex, the behaviour is different. It started off by extending its frontal leg and vibrates. Once approaches the female it will start poking the female face. But, the fun part is that this male spider can be fooled by immediately interchange the female to another male. It will still think its opponent is a female and continue to poke its opponent while the opponent try to fight him. After a couple of poking, then it started to realize and the actual male sparring begin.

I guess this sort of interest is not known to many children nowadays. I was fortunate enough to experience it and had the opportunity to learn more about this spider behaviour.

Penang Heritage Celebration

This was held on 25 & 26 july 2009 to celebrate George Town's first anniversary listing as UNESCO world heritage sites. There were many events happening throughout the whole Georgetown i.e Teochew Opera at Goddess of Mercy temple, Hokkien Puppet show in Cheah Kongsi, Chingay, Islamic culture at Acheen St Mosque, Indian dance etc.

Cheah Kongsi was the first 5 great Hokkien clans (Cheah, Khoo, Yap, Lim & Tan) to be established in Penang. It is located at Armenien Street, George Town. The crescent moon blended nicely behind the temple.

Mirror showing the entrance to Cheah Kongsi.

A very distinctive Chinese sculpture and architecture at the interior of the temple. There was a Hokkien Puppet theatre show just in front of the temple.

This traditional show was in Hokkien dialect and the puppet was controlled by hand. Many tourist be it locally or oversea came to see the show. It was good to bring this show in such event as this art is dying with the younger generation are not being exposed or having no interest to inherit this traditional show.

On my way to Khoo Kongsi(walking distance from Cheah Kongsi), I came across a shop selling various antiques. I remember that my grand uncle did carry me using this similar olden days bicycle. Khoo Kongsi is the grandest clan temple in Malaysia and located at Cannon Square, Georgetown. It is a must visit place for tourist in Penang. Usually, this place can be visited between 9-5pm daily and for this special event, I was fortunate enough to view the temple at night. Our new Penang Chief Minister, Mr Lim Guan Eng, came to visit this place as well. Some of my friends took photos with him.

It was a great experience to visit these heritage sites and support such event to shore more tourist to come to Penang. The Pearl of the Orient, not only offers such historical spots but also popular for its food.

Kampachi Buffet Dinner

Yesterday, I had my Japanese buffet dinner at Kampachi, Hotel Equatorial Penang. The food was simply marvelous and there were plenty of Japanese food varieties to choose from.

This was one of my food selections and I had the octopus balls, soft crab roll, Unagi sushi and the grilled lobster. I think I had taken more than ten plates of food before my tummy surrender.

It was my first experience trying this pregnant fish known as Shishamo(Willow Leaf Fish). We eat them as a whole and the best part were the fish eggs. Surprisingly, they tasted great. I was wondering how this fish could carry so much eggs which occupied almost the entire fish body....

Europe & UK Tour - UK

I decided to write my first blog about my childhood European dream trip. After many years of saving and right timing, finally I got the opportunity to visit these medieval countries together with my uncle. We took the Contiki tour and spent some free and easy days in London and some places in Europe. The whole trip took about 25 days and had visited 9 countries (UK, Holland, Germany, Switzerland, France, Italy, Belgium, Austria, Czech Republic).

Our first destination was London. After long hours of flight from Kuala Lumpur, finally we reached the London Heathrow Airport late evening on 28 April 2006. With all the adrenaline flowed from our excitement and curiosity, we totally forgotten about the exchaustion during the flight. We made our check-in at Generator London and started our first night exploration to Picadilly circus. This lively place filled with many visitors watching the street shows. It was so much fun to see the majestic old British buildings, red double decker tourist buses and telephone booth which signify UK infrastructure features. Without hesitating, I took a couple of shots with my brand new Canon EOS350D and spent a while before returning to the inn for Zzzzz. The real exploration started on the next morning. We woke up very early in the morning and followed our daily plan.

Piccadilly Circus revisited during the day....

Nicely built sign board at Piccadilly Circus

Big Ben also referred as the clock tower, located at the north eastern end of Palace of Westminster in London.

Could not resist to take the night view of Big Ben and the Parliament....

Change of Horse Guard. There was another one at Buckingham Palace but did not manage to watch that due time constraint.

Buckingham Palace, the official London residence of the British monarch

Resting around St James's park after non-stop walking tour in London

Another garden, Kensington Garden. Holly Cow...It was chilling cold on that evening.

Tower Bridge....I always thought this bridge was London Bridge but it wasn't. London bridge located beside it and looked not that spectacular compared to this one.

St Paul Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral dated from 17th century. Though no photo taking is allowed in the cathedral, the interior were fantastic and peaceful.

London View from St Paul Cathedral....

My first castle experience in the Tower of London. There were many towers in the castle such as the White Tower, Bloody Tower, Bell Tower, Tower Green, Fusiliers museum and many more.

A typical British Royal guard with tall bearskin hat and red costume. Wondering whether the hat now are still made of this pelt of black bear fur ....

Westminster Abbey, London's premier church which was build and opened since 1065. Its first coronation was William the Conqueror. many politicians, generals and artists being buried there.

Colourful buildings at Nothing Hill

Salisbury was my only destination outside London. Getting there mainly to fulfil my Seven Wonders coverage, the Stonehenge. It was believed to be a place of worship and ritual. Well, that wraps up my UK tour coverage and had added my 7 Wonders collection to 2 (after Great Wall of China). Below are some brochures that I took back home.

Europe & UK Tour - Netherlands

Amsterdam

My Contiki Tour in Amsterdam began with the river cruise along the canals and was really worth it. The first thing that caught my sight were the bicycles. You can see thousands of bicycles in Amsterdam as they are still currently the favourite transportation. I got to know from the tour leader that bigger door size means the house owner has to pay higher tax. Therefore, some big furniture were moved into the house through the higher floor using crane.

River cruise along the canal....

The house boat along the canal during the river cruise

Bicycle are still a popular transportation in Amsterdam.

Another view during river cruise....

During the nightfall, our tour leader took us to the red light district which is a popular night spot for prostitution. It is a legal activity and we were warned not to take any photographs there as to protect individual privacy. Our night ended with a life show...(u know what I mean).

In the next morning, we had a couple of hours to spend in Amsterdam before continue our journey to the next country. We took the opportunity to try the local food and visited the sex toy shops. Amsterdam is popular with the fast food chain shops such as Febo and we enjoyed the chips topped with mayonnaise. Another recommended local food was the herring fish. We tried this exotic food but not to my liking. Due to currency conversion, we did not buy much souvenirs but I reminded myself to at least buy a decoration refrigerator magnet or key chain as a token of memory.

Though my visit to Amsterdam was short, it had exposed me with lots of memorable experiences and interesting sights. The only thing that fell short on this tour was no itinerary to visit the windmill and the Tulips garden. That was compensated during my Netherlands revisited plan after the tour.

Zaanse Schan

After completing the Contiki tour, I revisited Netherlands by my own. Zaanse Schan was a very relaxed pleasant self arranged trip. Basically almost all I wanted to see in Netherlands can be found in Zaanse Schan. Clog and cheese making can be found in this place. Not to mention too about the colourful windmills along the river bank. One of them was opened for public viewing to understand the operation of the windmill.

Netherlands architecture

Cheese making

Clog making

Clogs readily to be sold as souvenir

One of the windmills in Zaanse Schan

Kinderdijk

One of the most preserved windmills are found in Kinderdijk. I went south purposely to visit this place and had to stay overnight in Rotterdam. It delivered as it promised. I could see many windmills strategically located along the long stretch of riverbank. They looked more natural than the colourful ones found in Zaanse Schan.

The cube houses(total 38) in Rotterdam were designed by architect Piet Blom in 1984

Long stretch of windmills in Kinderdijk

Fatso encounter!

View from one windmill to another....

Keukernhoff

Another great place worth a visit during the spring time is Keukernhoff. It is located about 10km from Haarlem and I heard that the cycling journey to this place was breathtaking. I decided to cycle and the experience was unbelievable. It was a mix feeling with a bit nervousness not to lost my way and at the same time felt the magnificent view at my very own pace.

View of the last portion of red tulips being harvested just a kilometre or two from Keukernhoff

All the tulips were blooming in Keukernhoff garden and there were plenty of Kodak moments to capture these colourful tulips.

Anybody like white tulips?

How about the flaming red ones?

The end of my tour in Netherlands.