For Sparky and myself, curiosity drives passion which in turn fuels our life's engine. Our passion was capturing the story of both unbuilding the Grace (1929 - 2007) and Pearman (1966 - 2007) Bridges and discovering the unbuilders. It takes a lot of passion to track a project from July 2005 until April 2007 - rain, shine, hurricanes or moving to Singapore. We discovered the joy of discovery learning. Ken Canty opened the front door for us - then Steve Testa, Ponch Billingsley and Mickey Rogers opened many side doors. Below are the highlights of what we discovered, who we met and what we learned.
And a reminder from T.S. Eliot (East Coker from the Four Quartets)
Home is where one starts from. As we grow older The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated Of dead and living. Not the intense moment Isolated, with no before and after, But a lifetime burning in every moment And not the lifetime of one man only But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
Getting there - we took the Batam ferry from Harbor Front - and wound our ways around the cargo ships to Batam. Then by van to another island, then by boat to Lincoln's place. Here are our GPS tracks
To get there, we had to cross from Batam to another island over a cable stay bridge
A closer view
We took the ferry from Singapore to Batam - and then overland, to a small river where we loaded everything on a small sanpan for about a 45 min ride to the kelong. A kelong is a small wooden home on stilts built for fishing. Loading
The boat trip to Lincoln's Kelong
The Kelong where we stayed
A nearby home
Lunch - a seafood delight
Some fished
Evening of the first day
The next morning, we found a Praying Mantis - cleaning its antennae. She / he starts at the nearing part to her / his head and gradually builds a loop until the entire antennae is whatever
A small loop
A larger loop
An even larger loop
Finished
A view from the top
Then off I went in search of insects - more focus practice. First I found a small small grasshopper inside a flower
Then Sunday morning - Here are two mating brownish dragonflys
A red dragonfly from the top
an aqua damselfly (I think)
Another red dragonfly
What I call a tiger dragonfly - sort of tiger stripes
Another red dragonfly
A blue dragonfly
The morning of our last day (Tuesday) - just enjoying the quiet
Reflections of the poles that support the nets
Bringing back the morning harvest
A last look along the boardwalk
Checking the fish nets
Breakfast - fried noodles, prawns and eggs
Leaving our weekend home
A bit further away view
Another kelong - in the middle of the channel
Going home down the last river
Unloading and off to the Batam Ferry Terminal
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
C. Frank Starmer