Private Lives: An Exposé of Singapore’s Rainforests

July 5, 2012 at 8:38 pm | Posted in itchy mouth | Leave a comment
Tags: Animals, Books, Design, Education, Environment, Museum, Nature, News, Uniquely Singapore

Yesterday, Itchyfingers attended the launch of the fourth and last book of the PRIVATE LIVES series. This book focuses on the biodiversity of our rainforests.

The invitation cum poster of the launch

The previous three books of the same series produced by the Raffles Museum
of Biodiversity of Singapore (RMBR) and the National University of
Singapore (NUS). Itchyfingers are lucky to be involved in both the second book
about mangrove, as well the latest book on rainforests

It was really a pleasant surprise when Professor Peter Ng announced that there will be a fifth Private Lives book in the pipeline! He jokingly said that it’s because ‘four’ is inauspicious number in Chinese…hahah…But it’s nice as the first book was about lives above the sea (intertidal) and the last one will be about lives beneath it…

The coral reefs!!!! Something that I may not have much chance to see as
I can’t swim properly to save myself, let alone scuba dive to see the
magical underwater world….

The introduction by Prof was quite short this time round, and the talk ended with this slide which made many among the audiences let out a ‘wow’….

A sneak preview of the model of the new natural museum to be ready 
somewhere in 2014. Sadly, it will no longer be called the Raffles Museum
of Biodiversity of Singapore (RMBR) 

Guest-of-honour, Dr Yaacob Ibrahim, Minister of Information,
Communications and the Arts getting ready to launch the book. Ironically,
he had to cut the ‘tree’ in order to present the book. The idea being, hopefully
we will be able to preserve our natural environment and not just leave a
book behind for the younger generations. Hmmm…nice idea. But I doubt
the government can understand this, cos otherwise, Bukit Brown will not
have to give way to roads… 😦

Yeah! Book launched!

Besides the book, a web portal archiving Singapore’s natural history was also launched.

A screen capture of the website of The Digital Nature Archive of Singapore,
or simply the DNA of Singapore. You can find huge archives with scientific
papers, imageries and videos. It is a work-in-progress site as collection
of datas is always on-going 

The Straits Times report on 5 July 2012. Look out for another report
on the book on next Tuesday’s paper!

The book cover features one of our native nocturnal mammals, the Colugo
with a baby, by Mr Norman Lim, who did a study and wrote a book on it 

Spread on birds

Spread on butterflies

Spread on pangolin! I wish to see this in our forests one of these days!

Private Lives: An Exposé of Singapore Rainforests, like the previous three books, is suitable for anyone who is interested in nature. You can get your copy at RMBR, NUS Co-op, Nature’s Niche, Select Bookstore and the Library Shop at the Singapore Botanic Gardens at $22 for paperback and $35 for hardcover version. All proceeds from the sale of the books will go towards more nature publications and biodiversity projects! What are you waiting for? 😀

P.S: You can now find the Private Lives books series in Kinokuniya! 😀

Also see related posts:
> Dragon Taking Flight
> Private Lives: An Exposé of Singapore’s Mangroves