Colours Of Nature: The Tree Huggers

Nothing revivifies our family better than a walk amongst the giants of nature. Even in insanely crowded Singapore, we try to escape far from the madding crowds on a regular basis - just so we can maintain our sanity, breathe a little freely, and retreat into our inner selves.

One recent walk that we really enjoyed was in the MacRitchie Reservoir Park. We hike here regularly because we love the serene combination of a large, tranquil lake and uncultivated forests deep within the park. Being mainly flat, it is also a relatively easy hike, compared to the steeper Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, so we could always stop anywhere and admire the amazing wildlife around us.

On that particular hike, we spent more than 3 hours traversing the edge of the reservoir waters alongside its boardwalk trail and wandering deep into its primary forests.

It was such a leisurely walk where we ambled along, spotting all kinds of wildlife like gigantic spiders, sun skinks, monkeys, kingfishers and all kinds of exotic birds, as well as damselflies and dragonflies. We loved the fact that these wildlife seemed really tame, nestled deep in nature, away from the harmful reaches of vile human intervention.

Long-tailed macaque monkeys

Nature's glorious beauties. Can you spot the spider with its intricate web?

This spider, perched in its huge web high above us in the forest, is as big as my hand (or bigger!)

Can you see the Common Sun Skink?

We loved the feeling of pure isolation in the forests, where we could be trudging along narrow paths without meeting another soul, surrounded only by towering trees that had seen more of this world than any one of us.

We shushed each other at regular intervals just so we could enjoy the pregnant silence of nature. And what deafening silence it was! Once human noises were curtailed, our ears were treated to the vociferous orchestra of the wild - the undulating trills of invisible birds, the hypnotic chirrups of  territorial crickets and the incessant whispering of stalwart trees.

The girls also used this opportunity to embrace these valiant trees, climbing as high as they could on the stout shoulders of these stately elders. They loved the feel of the textured bark on their hands and revelled in the support of the strong trunks and branches.

It was such a rejuvenating morning, and we are truly blessed by the myriad biodiversity in our very own forests!

Pirouette Away!

Dance is an amazing way for children to express their emotions through movement. It defies the usual conventions of using words - which are already laden with social engineering, in my opinion - to express oneself. For me, it is a platform where we can return to the most primitive form of expression through body movements and actions.

We attended a couple of performances in their ballet open house some time back, and it was so heartening to see how they had grown in their journey of dance. 

Little Bee was a little shaky in the beginning of her ballet experience a couple of years ago. As someone who does not enjoy rote learning, she was not keen to remember dance sequences, so this had always been a problem for her. However, attending primary school in the rigid Singapore education system might have some repercussions in her approach to ballet, because this year, she started remembering and practising more advanced ballet sequences much better! 

We were also treated to Big Bee's ballet performance in a class of strapping tall girls. How they had all grown! As some parents commented, these girls had gotten so advanced that watching their open house dances was akin to watching a professional classical ballet performance! The highlight of their performance was a Spanish flamenco dance which was truly energetic and captivating.

It was an afternoon of pride and happiness - at how they had transformed in an art form that they both enjoy tremendously. I would love for them to continue pirouetting along this boulevard of dance for as long as they like...enjoying the journey, and discovering new things about ballet and other forms of dances too!