Animals are also our "brothers" and "sisters"

Learning from Ant, The Discoverer

"Teacher of Achievement"


I bought a fried egg-coated milkfish and three slices of soybeans for dinner. But I couldn’t use them up at once. To prevent them of being spoiled, then I re-fried the rest and saved them in my locker for my breakfast for the next morning. I was sure they would not be stolen by cats or rats. So I did not worry about that side-dishes.

Breakfast time had come. Imagining the delicious milkfish, I opened the locker. How disappointed I was! No cats or rats had stolen my milkfish and soybeans, but ants! They swarmed over it! There was a line of troopers coming and going directly to and from my locker. I was so annoyed by them! They was out of my estimation that there might be a “spy” watching me putting them in my locker. Poor I was, luck for the colony…

It was an ordinary event actually. Nothing’s odd with it. But something occurs in my mind: So, the ants got the hiden milkfish! How could “the spy” find it and then told the others to “celebrate” the discovery?

Scientist has told us that ants have antennas as radars. That’s why they can detect objects to find. From this information I try to make a reconstruction: Smelling milkfish has been detected by a certain ant. It made an identification on the smell that led it to the source. The ant knew what it was looking for! Then it moved back and forth looking for the source of the smell ceaselessly. Footprints were made as a clue for the coming back to the colony. (Has an ant ever been lost? Hehehe…) After a long journey of tracking, and only led by the smell, finally the ant found the object, my delicious milkfish! “Hurrrraaay…!!!” it shouted cheerfully. It picked up a bite of sample and went back to the colony. It told everybody about the discovery by clinking their antennas ones to another. And they just followed the trace to the object. “It’s time to feast!” the shouted happily. And so the celebration began!

“Congratulations!” If I were one of them, surely I’d like to say that for the achievement. Why not? The discovery of the hiden milkfish was a kind of achievement, wasn’t it?

Insights:
Lessons I’ve got from the discoverer ant would be:
• Identify the real target to achieve!
• I should know what I’m looking for so that I could recognize when I find it.
• I should not give up for the achievement.
• Keep in mind the clues to prevent of repeating the same mistakes.
• I should share what I’ve got to others.
• Celebrate the achievement as a thanksgiving!

Thank you discoverer ant! You are a good teacher of achievement and sharing of life! ***


NB.: The picture above was uploaded by my friend s_bala, myLotter from India, with title "Ant, one of wise creatures". Thanks for it!

A separated bluebottle (fly)

It's a bluebottle (fly), showing its beauty than its disgust.

I pictured it in Kaliurang, Jogjakarta, Indonesia on January 10th, 2007.

When I was in a park at Merapi View Guardhouse on January 10th, 2007, I was very much attracted by a bluebottle settling down on a leaf of a beautiful plant. There is an opinion that bluebottle is a disgusting animal as well as commonly we suspect flies. They accustom to swarm over stinky carrion, or organic things that’s going to putrefy. That's why they are accused to be responsible of the spreading of bad microbas. Seeing them we may feel loathing. Extreemly different was this bluebottle! What I saw was a beautiful one! Do you see the picture above? I think you agree it won’t make us feel loathing. Does a question why raise in your mind?

I asked my friend to comment on this. He said, the bluebottle looks so beautiful because of the circumstances. It was in a beautiful place, so it does seem like. Thus, its beauty came from outside.

It makes sense I think. But, what about the bluebottle itself? Has it no beauty at all? I’m afraid my friend just had a kind of negative opinion doe to the common opinion about this creature.

I did’t know actually what happened to this bluebottle. Why didn’t it fly away when I got very close to have it pictured? Was is sick? Was it sad? Was it dying? What was it doing? I didn’t know... What I knew was it was alone, separated from the others. And it’d chosen the right place, I thought. The leafs and little fruities arround just gave it impression on its inner-beauty. It has taken for granted that God created such creature. It has no wrong being a bluebottle, beautiful one.

Note:
Separation enables us to consider our objective existence. Supported by the right circumstances, we could find our own beauty before the Creator.

“... and God saw that it was good.” - (Gen 1,20-25) ***

Small fishes in my pool ...

I've just been in the corner of my office building yard, looking at a pool with some fishes in there. They were swimming naturally while picking something to eat from the bottom of the pool. Sometimes they got some food from the root of some plants flooding over it. View months ago there was no pool in the yard. But now, there is a living even some small fishes in a little bit of water, fishes with little mouths picking food that I just don't know where it is from. My friend and I've never given them pellets or whatsoever. But they can eat and alive, growing up day by day.

I wondered...
There is abundance of living for everyone who knows how to get it and then struggle for it. ***