ANOTHER BAD DAY?

 WHY ME? ANOTHER BAD DAY?

After a recent harrowing experience with my first on-line trade in May 2010 with a bottle of cologne, I realized that I had opened myself wide to potential predators who would have no qualms of ripping up unsuspecting victims. I had done a foolish thing not to have taken the time and care to list the group of sales properly  and I've made corrective action to prevent another incident from happening again.

If this event had happened many years ago, I would have an amygdale attack. In layman’s term, that means I would have reacted poorly and my hot temper would have taken over my grey matter, pushing aside any possible means of logical reasoning. In many cases, it has lead to dire personal consequences… hurt lives, lost opportunities, lost relationships and a loss of self-worth and respect.

As a young lad in a foreign land, I got picked on by a superior who always found fault in everything I do. I’m never good enough, my boots are never polished enough, my uniform is this... he always have something to pick on. Besides, no one else on the crew ever got chewed on. I had a venomous relationship with him. Why me? When the right questions are asked, the answers may surprise you and perhaps, doubted upon at that time. He shared that with me. I sneered and I’m right back in boot camp. 

Reflecting back many years later, I would want to hug him and shake the hand of this drill-sergeant when I meet up with him. He was one of the key people who shape up my maturity.

Unfortunately, sometimes it takes time to appreciate a gift. That gift can come in unexpected forms. Like the 1985 recession. Why me? But like that drill-sergeant incident, I learned nothing from it. It took another major crisis to wake up my senses. The 1997 Asian economic crisis was one main event that shook me up. Why me? Again? When one is picking up the pieces after the Asian crisis and predators in the guise of a friend swindled me. Why me? But I’d supposed in a way, I had a small laugh by naming a newly-discovered worm after him.

Today coming this far, I am thankful to my family, a group of close friends and strangers who are now friends and especially my current business partner who have been supportive of helping me bridge through difficult times. I also want to thank the person who gave me that harrowing experience I wrote of in the beginning of this article as it reminds me that another bad experience is not necessary bad. Bad events are sometimes good teachers and they build, strengthen and develop a person’s self-worth and respect.

So if you are one of those who had a bad experience recently? Perhaps you could just take a breather in a quiet corner and ask… what good can come out of it? We all will have challenges in our every day lives. Will you become a stronger person or become a bitter person as an outcome of that experience? I have also learned to lean on a Greater Power for strength to weather through difficult storms. I find that during these difficult times, when I lay my troubles before God, I can find peace and a solution. Have Faith, He is Our Strength. God Bless You All.

Philippians 4:8 Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, what is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or trustworthy - think of such things.

 

 

DILL WHOLEMEAL BREAD ROLL

I love breads, especially country breads. The aroma of freshly baked bread stirs up memories of wood-fired ovens. Every bite tasted lovely with ingredients made from extra virgin olive oil, whole-wheat flours, fresh herbs and the smokey oven.

Back here in Kuching, it’s pretty hard to buy something like this in the local bakeries as they cater mostly to the white sandwich bread lovers. If one looking for German rye bread without the baker taking out the stout or a no-cheat sourdough, the nearest one can get in Kuching would be someone’s home kitchen you know of. With a little bit of adapting, you can enjoy something that close. It would be perfect if you own a wood-burning oven.

So here’s one of my favorite own recipes for dill whole-meal bread rolls with spices. Using cold water instead of warm water delays yeast action, allow the flour gluten to develop and improves the bread through slow-rising.

Finding fresh yeast in Kuching in small quantities is quite impossible so I have resorted to using instant yeast. If you are using fresh yeast, double the amount. The smaller amount of yeast also contributes to a slower rising time and with the lemon juice altering the pH of the water, adds character to the bread.

DILL WHOLE-MEAL BREAD ROLLS

This recipe is good for 15 rolls.

1. Whole-meal flour 491g
2. High-protein bread flour 132g
3. Brown sugar 18g
4. Water, chilled 418g
5. Instant yeast 4g
6. Lemon juice 7g
7. Rock salt 15g
8. Extra virgin olive oil 20g
9. Fresh dill, stalks removed 36g
10. Oats 74g
11. Combined spices of choice (caraway, cumin, fennel or any small seeds you liked) 2g

My favorite seeds are caraway, mustard seeds and cumin for this recipe.

Extra flour for dusting

METHOD

Combine the bread flour, brown sugar, water, yeast, lemon juice, salt and sugar together in a tall bowl. Stir them until they are thoroughly mixed. Stand aside at room temperature for an hour or until yeast starts showing signs of activity, that is bubbles begin to form on the surface.

Place the whole-meal flour, oats, dill and seeds in a mixing bowl and stir them together. Make a well in the center.

Add the olive oil to the water-yeast mixture and stir briefly. Pour this into the well of the flour and gradually stir the water-yeast mixture from the sides of the well against the side of the flour until the water is absorbed. At this point, the dough would quite wet at some places.

Empty the contents of the mixing bowl onto a flat, work surface and start kneading the flour for 5 minutes. The dough should be smooth and elastic and will not stick to the work surface.

Cover with a damp cloth for 45 minutes and allow to rise at room temperature or until the dough has doubled in size.

Meanwhile, oil a baking tray lightly with olive oil and set aside.

Knock back the dough and knead for another two minutes. Divide the dough into 15 equal parts (about 83g each). Roll them into a ball-shape dough and pressing gently against the sides, roll it into an oval shape. Dust the bottom of the roll lightly with flour and place slightly apart from each other. The dough will push against each other as they rise. Repeat for the rest of the rolls.

Cover with a damp cloth and allow to rise for another 30-45 minutes or until double in size. You may want to brush the tops with olive oil and sprinkle them lightly with rock salt before you place them into the oven.

Preheat oven to 180˚C/ 350˚F/ Moderate/ Mark 4. Bake for 25-35 minutes until rolls are light brown.

Remove from oven and rest on a wire rack for 10 minutes before serving.

The bread loaf shown here were made into a singular loaf instead of bread rolls. A spoonful of turmeric powder was also added in as I love the richness of the spice

LIVE FOODS; Lumbricucus sp ‘chungming’

In the hazy, crazy days of bell-bottoms, Brooke Shields and Saturday Night Fever, looking for live foods such as tubifex worms to feed your fishes was quite a breeze. One just had to look for a drain with soil embankments and work towards finding a mass or patches of red, wriggling worms on a warm day. To collect it, it involved lots of elbow grease, a pair of Wellington boots and rubber gloves (or a willingness to wade in bare footed and hands… aha, I know what you are thinking right now), a pail and the ability to withstand the stench of rotting vegetation and gases that will floor an upper-crust gal within milliseconds. 

Those days, it was a miniature feat to balance the-boy-on-bicycle with one hand on the handlebar and the other clutching the pail and boots (and nose, too). Fish shops would also stock this item and it was a common inventory for fish-shop operators.

It’s different these days. Much of the infrastructures have been upgraded to divert the floods that regularly awash Kuching during the Landas season. Cement embankments are the norm now. These days, natural T. tubifex population(s) is an item extremely difficult to find. I believed that chemical pollution also diminished the population of T. tubifex.

I visited a spot that used to yield aquatic worms which I used to collect when I was a teenage. It is a small patch of sandy ditches that had withstood development and managed to collect a golf-ball size of worms over a period of several days. It could only be done during early morning or late evenings.

I attempted to breed them in 2008 and 2009, using methods described for breeding tubifex and blackworms and all attempts failed. During the beginning of March 2010, I decide to try another time. By now, parameters had been correctly established for conditions needed to breed. This time, the worms started laying creamy colored cocoons which when hatched, appeared as red botches across the surface. Eventually as they grew, they start spreading into a wide maroon-colored patch across the media.

However, my success was short-lived as parasitic invaders in the form of tiny moths started to breed in the troughs they were housed in. Clouds of these moths swamped the troughs and laid masses of eggs that hatched into small creamy larvae and competed with the worms for food. To make matters worse, the creamy-colored larvae developed into black-colored larvae about 10mm long and started to feed on the baby worms and almost decimated the worm population. 

Most of the fishes refused to eat the black larvae. The only fishes that seemed not to mind them were the halfbeaks Hemirhamphodon kuekenthali and freshwater glass prawns Palaemonetes paludosus. So it was a time-consuming task to rip out the troughs, collect any remaining adult and juvenile worms and quarantine them for several days before housing them in new sterilized troughs housed in a different area. All this for a worm. Oh, there is this funky² smell too.

After prolonged, close observations, I have concluded that this worm is neither Tubifex tubifex or Lumbricucus sp. blackworms. Stirring the soil or media and allowing it to settle, T. tubifex will start clumping together into a tight ball of worms on the surface of the media but this worm will not clump together unless the container is bare. L. blackworms thrives in cold water whereas this worm does not like cold water. So I shall nickname this worm Lumbriculus sp. chungming, aka Khoworm after a certain low-life-form-from-Kuching I know of.

There is another type of worm with different behaviors although they look almost the same. This worm was extremely difficult to extract from the media where they were collected from. Once unearthed, each worm will curl into an individual knot and will not clump together unless the container was bare-bottom too so I decided to nickname them Lumbriculus sp knotti.

This worm is of special interest as it seems to be very tough and can survived polluted, anaerobic waters, dried-out media and warm conditions including being under the sun. A trial involves placing a culture in a small bowl with media that receives direct sun during the afternoons and they have survived for more than three weeks without much food and water, wringing their tails after showers fill the bowl. L. sp. knotti  also does not attempt to escape from the container they are housed in whereas L. sp. chungming demands specific water conditions, temperature and other parameters otherwise they (Bless his soul, they are as slippery as he is) will crawl out very fast from the container they are housed in. L. sp. chungming also will not clump into a ball like T. tubifex unless they are housed in a bare container without any media.

My juvenile wild-collected Betta brownorum started losing their shyness once they were fed with chungming and knotti worms and quickly adapted to their new surroundings and grew into healthy adults. I hope to be able to establish a large population of disease, virus-free chungming and knotti worms for my fishes and offer any surpluses to hobbyists who share the same interest as we do.

   

BETTA BROWNORUM

Betta brownorum, a wild dwarf fighting fish was once found in numbers in the swamplands of Sarawak. This is easily the most beautiful member of the Coccina family. Unfortunately, rapid development take over many of their habitats and it is not easy to find these beautiful gems these days. They still exist in very small pockets of swamplands in highly tannin waters with pH sometimes as low as 3.5. These are wild-caught fishes last January 2010.

Breeding this fishes requires extremely clean water with a pH of 3.5-6.6. My experiences have shown that they will breed in shallow water with a depth of 3 inches up to 7 inches with a lot of Java Moss with the tank receiving indirect sunlight. The down side is they produce extremely small clutches of eggs (9-17 eggs) in a single breeding.

Field Trip to the Kayan River Basin (Revised)

21st October, Wednesday started out as a fine warm day with an ambient temperature of 31'C. A field trip to the Kayan River Basin was the order of the day. We headed up East first as my partner-in-crime (P.I.C.) wanted to visit his parents first. Upon arriving, they were out tending to their rice fields. Rice harvesting has started several days ago. 

Lunch was the next order of the day as we drove into town in search for grub. We headed towards the shops to grab some food to tank up. I, particularly warmed up to the Mee Mamak the first time, cooked by one of the stall operators. 

Unfortunately, the dish tasted different every other next visit. The last meal was quite a disaster as the dish did not resemble Mee Mamak at all, so I’ll be looking for new grub on my next visit.

After lunch, we started heading back towards Kuching and turn into a kampong (village) on the right side, we decided to look around in that area. Pushing our way into the thick undergrowth, we trekked towards the interior until we came across a shallow, clear stream. The temperature difference was immediately noticeable as we entered the jungle canopy as it was cool and comfortable. There were a few persistent mosquitoes determined to make a meal of us. My eyes are now on the lookout for leeches and Assassin bugs, the latter which can cause a really painful bite that last for days.

P.I.C. started sampling and immediately netted a few wild adult Betta ibanorum. This is a common fighting fish in this area. Meanwhile, I had started sampling further upstream. Dipping my net in yielded a few Rasbora caulimaculata, Rasbora einthovenii and Rasbora pauciperforata. Sweeping under the leaves on the sand-bed, there was a small maroon colored fighting fish caught in the net. Betta brownorum but without the greenish-blue spot. I thought unusual to have found this fish in this type of topography. 

Several specimens were caught later, and all fishes lacked spots, which led me to conclude that these could be Betta rutilan. Collecting this fish was time-consuming as they could only be found scattered, almost always singularly. As seen in these photographs, the paler fish is the female as the other fish is the male.

This was a surprising find as I had thought that this specie can only be found in Indonesia. The day was already late so it's time to pack up. There will always be another day. Who knows what one may find next.