Ho Chi Minh City – My brief overview

It was a few days ago that due to unforeseen circumstances I was suddenly asked to stand in for someone scheduled to conduct a seminar presentation in Ho Chi Minh City and here I am, my first trip to The Socialist Republic of Vietnam unexpected and unplanned for.

I arrived in Tan Son Nhat International Airport on a hot afternoon with a cloudy overcast. While the plane was taxing to the airport, I couldn’t help but notice many mini hangars that can be seen along the way. About half of them are empty with the other half filled with military helicopters and plane. The contrast compared to the main airport building was huge.

As you step into the main airport building, it can give any other airport in terms of creature comfort and convenience a run for its money, however things took a turn as you step out to get a taxi. Chaos rules once outside, even my host was clearly embarrassed with the situation. Taxi with horns blaring was driving in and out, jumping queues and ignoring basic traffic rules picking up passengers who are not too sure which taxi should be taken. Surprisingly there seems to be uniformed people with walking talkies coordinating the whole thing.

If asked to drive in this city, I will not be capable enough nor have the guts to do it. All this while I thought only motorcyclist and drivers in Central Jakarta have suicidal tendencies but it appears that this is clearly not the case. With the haphazard driving style and motorbikes weaving in and out of traffic I wonder why some of the motorcyclist bothers to wear special mask for protection against the polluted environment, that in fact should be the least of their life threatening worries.
I somehow finally make it to the office in one piece and not a moment too soon, I was told I had just missed the hungry lunch crowd this must be my lucky day. After settling down, lunch was on the next agenda. My first introduction to authentic Vietnamese food, beef noodles.

The flavoring is not as strong as the ones available back home but the presentation, side dishes and condiment accompanying the noodles is somewhat different, I actually like it.
In the afternoon it was back to the office to have a discussion for tomorrow’s assignment, which took the better part of the day. Evening was a real culture shock, I was taken to have dinner in a Czech beer house, in the middle of urban Ho Chi Minh City, being serve Vietnamese food and imported Czech beer with German sounding beer drinking songs being played in the background.

I notice the Czech consulate also happen to be conveniently located in the same building.
All things must come to an end and I had to make my way back to Kuala Lumpur the next evening.

Flea beetles

Belonging to the leaf beetle family it is often seen, yes you guess right, on leaves feeding. They are small beetles and if not for their often bright attractive colors it would be difficult to spot them.

Observing them closer you will notice that their hindlegs are bigger which helps them to jump like a flea, hence the name Flea beetles.

Sometimes they are regarded as pest especially when they are found to attack agricultural crops as they feed on plants eating the various parts from leaves to stem.And when feeding on weeds they are considered beneficial, although I would think, what is a pest or not really depends on which perspective we choose to look from. To the flea beetle, all it was doing was eating something available to survive.

Dragonflies of Malaysia - Crimson Dropwing (Trithemis Aurora)

To begin with let’s start off with some basic information on what is a dragonfly
A dragonfly is an insect, have six legs, sees the world through large multifaceted eyes, comes with two pairs of strong transparent wings, all housed in an elongated body (....we all know that, of course!). It belongs to the order Odonata, suborder Epiprocta....infraorder Anisoptera.....and so forth. They are usually sighted near ponds, lakes and wetlands because their nymphs are aquatic, to put it in less entomological terms, dragonfly babies are born and before developing wings, spend their lives in water.



More interesting facts about dragonflies are, even with six legs they are incapable of walking. Dragonflies are predators that devour other small insects like mosquitoes, flies and ants. On a hot sunny day dragonflies would point its tail end towards the sun, minimizing its body surface exposure to the sun to keep itself cool. A dragonfly can fly in multi directions, upward, downward, forward, back, and side to side. In most dragonfly species the males are brightly colored and more attractive then the females

Most of the dragonfly’s life are spent as a nymph, it has been documented that some species are nymphs for a few years before it metamorphosed into a flying dragonfly only for a few months.
Photo of a male Crimson Dropwing is shown above. It is the only known dragonfly species in Peninsular Malaysia to have this dark rosy pink color. The female species has a dull brownish yellow color with a tinge of pink patches in some parts of the body. I observe males are more common then females.

Assassin bug

Based on Scientific classification, Assassin bugs are members of the family Reduviidae in the true bug order Hemiptera

Living up to its common name of Assassin Bug, it is a predatory insect that has long-legs, normally exhibiting dark sinister colors, black, brownish or reddish complete with beady eyes and extended proboscis or some calls it rostrum, not a pleasant sight when magnified.

It can fly as witnessed by the author with very rapid wing movements albeit slowly.
Assassin bugs catches prey with a death grip, using its foreleg that in some species have sharp barbs that makes it difficult to escape, next the proboscis are then used to penetrate the prey injecting a potent digestive juice into the prey, paralyzing and killing the prey mercifully in a matter of seconds. The liquefied muscles and tissues of the prey are then sucked up much like us drinking water using a straw, a scenario befitting any horror movie.


But I think this is an efficient method of feeding where food is externally digested, avoiding the need for chewing and other necessities that goes with it. At the same time, I can imagine an accidental bite from them would be extremely painful, severely uncomfortable at the very least and requiring long healing time.

Found throughout the world, they are considered beneficial for insect pest control as generally their preferred food are insect that we considered as pest, like cockroaches, flies and termites.
Supposedly carnivorous but the specimen shown (Cosmolestes picticeps) is one species reported in Malaysia to also feed on nectar of flowers, this is of course not verifiable. There are also some other species reported that feeds on blood of mammals.