Singapore 2: Night Safari

The evening after the City Tour, we were set for a Night Safari Tour. We rode a bus on the way to the place and the tour guide briefed us as to what would be happening. He was another Indian guy who had a very dramatic speaking voice. It was dramatic in the cheesy corny kind of way. He went like, "When I went on the Night Safari, the tapirs were so cute! But if you reach out and touch them, I'm afraid that your fingers will be... (hushed voice) missing in action..."

When we got to the place, we first had a buffet dinner which was part of the package deal. I stuffed myself with the tiny baby octopuses, naan bread and strawberries.

This is what the place looked like. Also, you can't see them very well but there were tons of Australians here.

A cool thing about this place was the bathroom. You'd open the door into the bathroom and find that it the lights were off. Step inside and the lights would magically come on! I was so impressed by this that I actually took a video of the lights coming on as I walked into the room. All the while I was thinking it sure would have been funny if someone were to walk in and see me taking a video of the lights? It just so happened that someone did and I had to quickly make my exit.

Even in Singapore, I'm a noob.

We left the buffet to go to the tour and we were greeted by a long line of safari-goers. Just then, Gabriel decided that it would be a great time to begin to whine about wanting to go home and about how he was so tired already. God, you can always count on this little guy to make a vacation difficult.

After much waiting in the hot humid line, we made it to the tram and as soon as we found our seats, we were off. The tram itself was a long series of cars connected together. The only protection we had was a roof over our heads, the rest of the thing was open air. Somewhat disappointingly, safety wasn't an issue though since the animals weren't free to roam around as I had previously imagined. Their areas were designed with water surrounding the enclosure or deep ditches on all sides for animals that were afraid of heights. Only the tiger pen had a full on glass divider between the tram and its enclosure, a testament to this animal not giving a fuck about heights or water.

The night safari itself was pretty cool. We got to see some Asiatic Lions and the much more majestic African Lions. I think my favorite animal was the Indian Rhino. It looked so powerful and the thick skin folds on its body made it look so impenetrable. I don't think even full-grown tigers would wanna mess this this guy.

Taken fron Wikipedia

It looks like it's wearing ass armor!

I also like hippos because they're so badass and they're the closest living relative of whales!

That enough animals for now.

I'll talk about Universal Studios next time since it deserves a post all on its own.

The Final Chapter of College and My Life Decision

Alright. I promised a Singapore part 2 but I gotta write about this now since it's a more pressing issue.

My life decision.

If you know me then you probably know that I've been in limbo for the whole of my college life. I never knew if I was gonna go to med or not. To be honest, it was never originally part of the things that I thought to do with my life in my senior year of high school. The only reason I even thought to go into medicine was because I thought that it was a great compromise between getting to study about biology and getting a "real" job as my mom and dad would look at it. After all these years of Health Sci and subjects like Org Chem, Biochem and Cell Mol along with the occassional med school horror stories of students that previously did well in college only to have a shitstorm of studying and mediocre grades in med school... It did not have the glamor of what it looked like when I was in high school. That isn't to say that the idea of becoming a doctor was ALL bad. I also saw the good things in med school: a chance to help people using science, a seemingly cool job where I tell people how to get better and a means to earn a decent living...

After all these things being put into consideration, I often end up getting no where with my decision.

In this final chapter of college though, I gotta decide fast and work so I can get there.

The best I have so far is a plan wherein I study to become a biologist and at the same time work a regular job for my dad. The idea came from one of my Philosophy teachers, Ma'am Nicole. She told me about how she went through similar experiences as I did where her parents would brush away the idea of her getting a masters and getting into academia. Eventually the glamor died down and she found herself wanting to make a little extra money along the side. So she worked for her family business while working for her masters. The idea of me working for my family business is about the last thing I wanted to end up doing but Ma'am Nicole assured me that it does become exciting as you get into it.

So here I am trying to work out a similar plan in life. I guess the next step at this point would be to find the right connections in the kind of work that I wanna pursue. I remember a tweet that I managed to get form Sir David Attenborough himself. He said that the cutting edge of biology was genetics. While I have had experience in Biochem and Cell Mol, my line of interest really lies in zoology in general. Maybe as I study biology further I can find something that really sparks my interest and then I can find a way to make a real contribution to society. Wishful thinking.

So these are my goals now:
1. Find out how I can make the most out of a career in biology.
2. Find out what I'll be doing when I work for the family business.
3. Work out a clear plan for the next few years (what masters to take, what school to go to, what classes I need)
4. Pull up my grades so I don't look like such a jabroni when I apply.

Hope all goes well.

Here's some Akwafina.