Close encounters with local wild life

I started getting pressure on expediting my posting frequency, thus finally here's the blog post concerning the local fauna. Today we happen to have a day off from work in the middle of the week to celebrate Deepavali or festival of lights. This is one of the benefits of living in a society which embraces multiple religions (in October we had Hari Raya Haji and next month obviously Christmas -- no need for wiki link for that one). So I have had plenty of time to do important things like visiting local IMAX theater, earn additional FourSquare badges (lvl 2 mall rat & trainspotter) and also documenting the my four+ legged room mates.

The apartment I have rented is located on the 2nd floor of a 22 storey building. During the first nights I realized that in addition to having some privacy from the nearby palm trees there is another added benefit from living near to the ground which is having the chance of meeting local wild life right here in the convenient confinements of my own home.

The occasional chirping sound I bestowed originally on some small crickets. Though I wondered how come it really sounds as if the chirping is coming from within the apartment and not outside. This jungle noise I put up with first couple of nights. Probably on the third night when I was just about to go to sleep I found the actual culprit. It was not a cricket but a translucent lizard which had found its way under my pillow! We looked at each other into the eyes for second and then she wiggled off the way lizards tend to slither quickly.

I left my bedroom and started to wonder what are people supposed to do with lizards crawling on their bed. Gathering courage I got myself a set of paper towels and decided to capture the little feller and show her (I expect it to be a she) out through the way of balcony. Quite quickly I realized that it is not likely that I'll capture her easily. Chirpy (as I dubbed her) is rather quick and can access places where me & my paper towel armament cannot reach. Also I started to wonder whether I could really hold the thing in the paper towel even if I captured her. She ran into my bathroom and decided to close the door behind her and leave it be for that particular night.

Through out the night I could hear Chirpy singing away in the locked bathroom (since then I have come to realize that doors don't really hold lizards as they can fit through underneath the door). In the morning I hesitantly went into the bathroom to take a shower. I turned on the light and try to pinpoint my new room mate using mirrors on the walls. And there she was. Slithered merrily across the walls as I had to enter shower. 

Later in the office the localites taught me that house geckos are very much part of living on the equator. These guys have actually been here way before humans so it's really us on their turf. Also I learned that geckos eat ants and spiders and thus are rather helpful than actual pests. Which there are also in these parts of the world: with the first cockroach sighting I decided not to adhere to live and let live/you were here first -philosophy, but bought an effective pest trap. Also since then I have seen my share of rats in the vicinity of the house (not inside luckily), big fat snails and during the dusk there are number of fruit bats flying over any occasional swimming pool user. I prefer not to meet any of the 108 species of snakes living in Singapore, like this one captured at a close by metro station.

 As a matter of fact I just heard the familiar "tsirp, tsirp, tsirp" sound coming from behind the nearby curtains. It must be Chirpy joining me for evening snack!

 

Chirpy AKA Sirkku