Natural Giants

Native to the tropical regions of South America. Giant water lilies (Victoria amazonica) known for huge leaves which can grow up to 3 meters in diameter and can support heavy objects. Belongs to the plant family Nymphaeaceae (family of water lilies) and accounted as the largest member of the family. This was taken at the Shuangxi Park (雙溪公園) of Taipei City, Taiwan. They hold an annual Floating Giant Water Lily Exhibition during the Lilly season. In promoting the annual event Taipei mayor was seen sitting on one of this giant lily. Visitors too can take a chance to sit on one of these and take a photo but need to register themselves priorly. 

Floating Giant Water Lily

Location: Shuangxi Park
Address: Intersection of Fulin Rd. and Zhishan Rd., Shilin District

Borders ...

Borders - The small lotus pond at the Taipei Botanical Garden

Taipei Botanical Garden is a nice little hideout from the buzzling urban city of Taipei. Although its relatively small in size they have arrange and managed it well. Its famous for the big louts pond. However, this is from just opposite to that pond... 

Time Lapse of Wufengchi Waterfalls* 五峰旗瀑布

* this is not the direct view of the falls but a side view. 

A thought in celebrating the World Environment Day...

Source: Dilmah Conservation

We all have these fellows... dont we?  Are we going to vote them in the next election...?  Better think of that next time... 

anyway

Hope for the best in the coming years and lets do something good for our mother nature... 

World Environment Day 2015!

Super Moon...

When I overheard the new about the super moon recently, I wanted to make snap of it. Unfortunately for me, Sky on the day (July 12) was full of clouds here in Taipei. However, I managed to capture a decent view of it on the day after. 

According to NASA, "perigee moon" is the scientific term for a super moon. It means the moon is at the point in its orbit that brings it closer to Earth. The result is that the world’s closest neighbor appears larger and brighter than usual – with breath-taking results.

Day after a Super Moon - 2014/07/13

I still have two more chances for this year, two other supermoons will appear later this summer on 10 August and 9 September. Let’s see how that goes.

Colombo to Taipei...

I just wanted to see the distance from Colombo to Taipei, the two capital cities of Sri Lanka and Taiwan respectively. I'm originally from Sri Lanka now in Taiwan, though I've been here for almost three years now didn't actually wanted to see how far actually I am away from my home. I had a rough figure around 3000kms and that seems to be a bad estimation, as it turned out to be actually around  ~4800 km. The circumference of Earth at the equator is about 40,075 km. Well with compared to that, this is just 1/10 of it... 

Colombo to Taipei

Reference: http://www.entfernungsrechner.net/en/distance/city/1248991/city/1668341

Sunsets to Nangang...

It was a beautiful view of the sunsets from my office room at the 11th floor at Academia Sinica over the Nangang Mountains. Reminds me of the panoramic sunsets that I used to have from my office at the Chinese Culture University in Yangmingshan.

Sunsets to Nangang Mountains

"Long live our wetlands"...!!

A comic that came out for the upcoming world's wetland day - Feb 02 from "ramsar"

However, the bitter truth is we are not ready to do this calculation before it is too late. In many cases, it is always after doing something irreversible that you realize that it could be avoided. So consider all the stakeholders and give proper weight to the ecological functions when you balance the sheet.

"Long live our wetlands"...!!

Happy Chinese New Year ... 祝您新年快樂。

It has been no so good year in terms of the blog, but was a breakthrough and successful year in other terms. Anyway, here we are stepping in to the new Chinese New year 2014. 

According to the Chinese lunar calendar, this year will be the year of horse. It great that the Chinese people have an animal dedicated for each year. There is this mythical story about a race of these animals and the years were dedicated according to the winners list. Mouse comes first in the list (though this mouse did some cheating in the race, where he travel on the horns of the ox and jumped in to the winning line at the very end, to become the first) and the ox second and so on. The Dragon is to be the most preferred animal among the dozen of them in the Chinese community. Is so famous, where it leads even to a extend resulting, higher birth rates in a dragon year with compared to the rest of the years, everyone wants to have a dragon baby!

© Internet 

Conservation Vs Development

The Environmental issues with regards to the natural forest degradation of Sri Lanka is on the rise. The main reason is the so called development activities after the liberation of the country from a 30 year war. We need the development but at what cost? If the authorities developing a car park for "Deyata Kirula" so called Development exhibition within a scantuary which is covered by a elecric fens, I guess they’re gone insane. Here is a good Interview done by the Young Asia Television’s Narada Bakmeewewa with Mr. Sajeewa Chamikara, the Director of the Environment Conservation Trust, Sri Lanka. 

© http://youngasia.tv/3d-thrimana

World Water Day | March 22

World Water Day is held annually on 22 March as a means of focusing attention on the importance of freshwater and advocating for the sustainable management of freshwater resources.

Year 2013 is also the International Year of Water Cooperation. They declared this in view of the organization’s multi-dimensional mandate in the realm of natural and social sciences, culture, Education and communication, and its significant and long-standing contribution to the management of the world’s freshwater resources.

There were a couple of activities in Sri Lanka and Taiwan on water conservation. Taiwan at the moment is facing a bit of water scarcity due to the lack of rainfall. Although the winter here in Taiwan, especially northern part is wet, but we are experiencing rather a dry Winter this time. Meanwhile, Sri Lanka experienced some extreme rainfall events  in last few months. All  these events evidence the climate change impacts. So it's a high time to act, but not just celebrating the day.

International Day of Forests | March 21

© YBA (Young Biologists' Association, Sri Lanka)'s photo

The United Nations General assembly has proclaimed 21 March the International Day of Forests. From 2013, the day will be observed each year to celebrate and raise awareness of the importance of forests and trees to all life on earth.

Sri Lanka featured in National Geographic Traveler

National Geographic Magazine once name Sri Lanka as one of their top destinations for this year. After the end of 30 years civil war, the country has become a peaceful and safe place for the travelers, hence boost the tourism industry in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka was a world famous tourist destination for edges. Apart from the traditional sun and beach tourism, Sri Lanka has moved into various new dimensions of tourism giving travelers ample choices to enjoy their stay in Sri Lanka. The National Geographic Traveler magazine has a special supplement dedicated to Sri Lanka, a 36 paged guide to travel in Sri Lanka. They have highlighted the country’s top 21 attractions for travelers in the  April 2013 issue.

Sri Lanka: Top 21 highlights

Wildlife of Formosa...

Taiwan is an island nation which is half the size of Sri Lanka (36,193 km2) in the western Pacific and straddling the Tropic of Cancer. Taiwan has a range of climatic zones from tropical to temperate, resulting in tremendous Biodiversity. However, the recent boost in economy with the increase of development  in the latter part of the 20th century, has given rise to serious issues related to the environment of the country. The country boast of over 20% of protected areas of its land cover.

Its claim to have a total of 1,257 fauna species, where 252 of them are endemic to the country (20%). The situation of the floral community is total species, 4,077 and endemic species of 1,067 (26%). You can find more information here. 

Following are some small collection of wildlife encountered by my stay in Taiwan, since 2011. 

The Central Formosa Toad - Bufo bankorensis (Bufonidae family) is a big toad species endemic to Taiwan. Very common toad in Taiwan. Habitat loss, collection for food and traditional medicine are common threats to this fork.

Babina adenopleura (Ranidae family) is a medium-sized frog species found in Taiwan, China, Japan, Vietnam and Thailand.IUCN Conservation status of this species is Least Concern (LC). [Previously known as Rana adenopleura]

The Beauty of Taiwan – In timelapse...

I recently came across with this time-lapse video about  Taiwan. They say it was shot on Canon DSLR’s over a period of two weeks covering Taiwan’s some most visited hot spots. I was delighted, hope you’ll enjoy it too… 

Wish you all a Happy New Year 2013!

Hope this 2013 would be a much greener and peaceful year...

World Bamboo Day - September 18

World Bamboo Day was declared by the Thai Royal Forest Department on 18 September in Bangkok, during the 8^th World Bamboo Congress in 2009. This declaration is an effort to increase the awareness of bamboo globally. 

Actually I never of this before. Just saw in the news flash as there was a activities to cerebrate this day in Sri Lanka. I'm not sure whether its officially accepted by the UN which normally do for other "days". However this is for the conservation and awareness of Bamboo therefore its good to have a "day" celebrate! 

Back in Sri Lanka we do have several varieties of bamboo and we do use them for various purposes. But unlike in east Asian countries like Taiwan, China, Japan etc we do not eat them. In Taiwan Bamboo shoots are well famous as a food.

http://worldbambooday.org

Taiwan Birdathon

"Yunlin and Chiayi counties, along with Greater Tainan, are to hold a marathon-style bird-watching race for the first time in November to raise environmental awareness and promote ecotourism on the island"

This is interesting, though I have herd of this before in central Taiwan’s Dasyueshan National Forest Recreation Area earlier this year. It seems this time they have focused the southern and the coastal birds especially the migrant endangered black-faced spoonbill. 

This is a different idea, However, I have my doubts that this will be a good way of promoting so called ecotourism  and raise environmental awareness. We'll see who's the winner and the count this time as the last event it was around 150 species for this 30 hour challenge. 

For more information checkout ... http://en.taiwanbirdathon.org/

Kuala Lumpur - Malaysia

Kuala Lumpur is the sixth most visited city in the world and following are some of the photos taken in a short trip to the city center on the way to Taiwan from Sri Lanka.

City Panorama of the KL, Malaysia

The Petronas Twin Towers -  tallest twin buildings in the world 

Malaysian ringgit

Sri Mahamariamman Temple, Kuala Lumpur's oldest Hindu temple

The Kuala Lumpur Tower - the 7th tallest telecommunication tower in the world

Colonial remaining s of the city

Telecom Museum

St. Andrew's Church

Jamek Mosque

KL's central market

Petaling Street, Kuala Lumpur's  Chinatown

Oil palm plantation

Taiwan's Yin-Yang Sea...

Yin-yang Sea is a kind of a special place where you can find in Jinguashi (金瓜石) coastal area. It is located in the Rueifang Township in Taipei County, this area is famous for its gold mines.

Yin – yang (陰陽) is a concept comes in Chinese philosophy which literally meaning "dark and light", is used to describe how polar opposites or seemingly contrary forces are interconnected and interdependent in the natural world, and how they give rise to each other in turn in relation to each other. I guess this name for this particular place matches well.

As you travel along the coastal highway No 02 you will see a strange scene in the sea - a bay where the color of the sea is a mix of yellow and blue a two contrasting color sea. This is called the Yin-yang Sea. It was initially believed that the sea color was the result of pollution from Taiwan Metal Mining Corp’s smelting activities but, over 10 years after the company stopped its activities, Yin-yang Sea still exists The geology here contains large amount of pyrite which has formed Fe3+ the course for the yellow / orange color and it does not dissolve easily in water.

The No.2 Provincial Route is the main connection between Taipei, Keelong and Ylan, Where you can reach the place. The nearby is the Golden Waterfall and the Jiufen old mining town. I have seen the runoff mixing with sea in Sri Lanka as well but it’s not like this and it does not occur for such a long period like this. Taiwan got many unique things to see, I believe that’s one of the reason for the saying “Taiwan touch your heart”

Yin Yang  Sea, Keelung, Taiwan

Do you feel a similarity with above and below images...? (Ok, I mean literally...)

Yin Yang of Fire and Water