25 | September | 2011 | Otterman speaks...

Yesterday, the natural history community had a blast of a time, catching up with each other at the Biodiversity of Singapore Symposium III (2011).

Photo by Fung Tze Kwan

As the dust settles, I file away mental notes in preparation for the next experience. One is – how did people click their way to the official webpage at biodiversitysingapore.wordpress.com?

As expected, Facebook reigns supreme. For blogs, note that WildSingapore highlights ALL my relevant posts so the count includes secondary jumps.

487 – Facebook (various)
249 – rafflesmuseum.wordpress.com
227 – otterman.wordpress.com (N. Sivasothi)
159 – mail.live.com and mail.yahoo.com (likely Habitatnews mailing list)
066 – nusbiodiversity.wordpress.com (N. Sivasothi)
040 – 36ohk6dgmcd1n.yom.mail.yahoo.net
039 – Twitter
035 – wildsingaporehappenings.blogspot.com (Ria Tan)
034 – wildshores.blogspot.com (Ria Tan)
023 – ivle.nus.edu.sg (NUS Student message board)
013 – toddycats.wordpress.com (N. Sivasothi)
012 – npss.org.sg
010 – tech.groups.yahoo.com
010 – butterflycircle.com
010 – biologyrefugia.blogspot.com (Brandon Seah/N. Sivasothi)
010 – otterman.posterous.com (N. Sivasothi)
009 – 36ohk6dgmcd1n.c.yom.mail.yahoo.net …
009 – link.smartscreen.live.com
007 – mail.google.com
007 – megamarinesurvey.blogspot.com (Ria Tan)
007 – iyb2010singapore.blogspot.com (Ria Tan)
006 – florafaunaintra.nparks.gov.sg
006 – coastalcleanup.wordpress.com (N. Sivasothi)
005 – webmail.singnet.com.sg
005 – groups.yahoo.com
003 – teamseagrass.blogspot.com (Ria Tan)
003 – exchange.nus.edu.sg
002 – mail.rgs.edu.sg
002 – natureramble.wordpress.com
002 – Google+
002 – web.ebuddy.com
001 – sgprotist.wordpress.com
001 – lazy-lizard-tales.blogspot.com

Having monitored registration closely from the first day in order to react to flow, signing peaks coincided with each push we made with a blog post, email release or appeal to volunteers to facebook the event.

Edit form - [ Registration for Biodiversity of Singapore Symposium 3 (Sat 24 Sep 2011: 8am-6pm) ] - Google Docs

Each avenue returned registrations – just keep notifying.

54% of the 362 who registered were not students. 154 (43%) registered early, within a week. Over a quarter registered just before the event – 44 (12%) registered in the last weekend, 57 (16%) registered after the first deadline. Two of the 362 thought to say thanks in the remarks field which was really great to see!

This means registration played out typically.

This time, though, there was facebook. So everyone could be a publicist, a big big difference with the well-attended, two-day Biodiversity Symposium of Singapore I in 2003.

Ria Tan of WildSingapore and several others in the natural history community like myself, have embraced facebook to share links since everyone is there. And then they share with their friends.

Our biggest regret always is an interested person not finding out in time. I think the community did enough to get the word out.

Meanwhile, for tweets of the symposium by Ivan Kwan and David Tan, see Twitter.

For media coverage of BG (Res) Tan Chuan-Jin launch of NParks’ “Community in Nature” programme, see WildSingapore News.

Lindy Glover is a lovely lady who is the daughter-in-law of an Aussie war vet and arm private Alexander Glover, 2/3rd Pioneer Battalion (RIP 1994) who was at Papua New Guinea during the war.

In 2008, the diary was unearthed and after a three year search, saw its way back to Yurie Nobuhiro, the orphan of Shigeaki Fukushina, then a petty officer in the Japanese Imperial Navy. Yurie lost her mother as well a few years later.

The diary, penned between December 1942 and March 1943, records her father’s time with his family before leaving Japan, his landing at New Guinea, being bombed at the frontlines and the memories of his family.

“One of the diary’s entries says, ‘Not a day goes by without thinking about my daughter,’ ” Nobuhiro said. “I’m impressed by the depth of my father’s feelings, yearning to return to his only daughter.”

Yurie travelled to Australia to thank Lindy last week.

The New Guinea campaign (1941-1945) was a major battlefield in the Pacific theatre of World War II and Japan’s southernmost reach. It saw the New Guinea offensives of 1943–44, which “were the single largest series of connected operations Australia has ever mounted.”

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