Gyōten Ningen Batseelor

Gyōten Ningen Batseelor is one of my favorite animé series. I used to watch Captain Fatz, as it was known in the Philippines, in the local channel at around 8 in the morning on weekends—back in 2001. I watched the animé religiously, I never skipped an episode. Sadly, I wasn’t able to watch it until the end of the series.

One Saturday morning, I woke up and found another animé has taken over my favorite series’ timeslot. At that time, I wasn’t sure if the animated series was moved to another timeslot or if my local network stopped airing it—I also thought that the series was unfinished; perhaps it was cancelled in Japan due to poor ratings.

After it stopped airing, I have been looking for ways to finish the series, but to no avail. I don’t know why Captain Fatz is so hard to find. The internet has very little information on the series. Animé websites like the Anime News Network and the Anime Web Turnpike has little or no information of the series at all. You can’t even find it in the illegal streaming sites. The only substantial information you can get about Gyōten Ningen Batseelor is found in Wikipedia and in other fan sites that copied the article from the free encyclopedia.

There is even no information about the manga from which the animated series was based. 

What is this animé about? Gyōten Ningen Batseelor otherwise known as Captain Fatz and the Seamorphs, is a Japanese animé that originally aired in Japan from April 7, 2001 until March 30, 2002.  The series was created by Itaru Ueda based on the manga of the same title by Fumiaki Tatesako.

The series follows Jan Zaruko, a female warrior from the land of light, who is tasked by the Priestess of Light to collect the peace stones. There are eight stones representing each of the elements of Light, Water, Earth, Air, Fire, Metal, Darkness, and Wood. The stones keep the balance of power in the world; each of the stone’s power can be harnessed by a chosen one to transform in to a powerful elemental warrior. Jan Zaruko is the elemental warrior of light.

During her travels, Jan bumps in to Gay and her sidekick Gorgo-girl. Gay curses Jan Zaruko, transforming her in to the anthromorphic monkey Jan Zaru. She meets the Captain Fatz—the gluttonous captain of the Seahorse, originally a handsome masculine pirate turned fat by Gay—and his crew. Together they sail around the world to thwart Gay’s evil plans.

I really don’t know how the series ended. I was only able to watch up until the part where Gay, sort of, reformed his ways and dragons—originally the peace stones—rose to bring chaos to the world. I just hope I to get to watch the rest of Gyōten Ningen Batseelor and finish the series very soon. 

Invite the Butterflies.

Earlier today, I was able to release another butterfly—it, sort of, flew right away after I took it out of the container.  I've kept it as a cocoon in a container for a week. It was a male Common Mormon (Papilio polytes)—I’ve been reading my lessons so I was able to tell that it was a male—I also compared it to the images online. 

Where did I get the cocoon? The one I released earlier, I got it from my father’s potted lemon tree. I get most of the cocoons from our yard. Some of them are taken from our neighbors’ plants, as a caterpillar or as a cocoon. My neighbors are lucky to have me; I rid them of their abomination. 

Three instars of a caterpillar

After collecting the cocoons, I keep them in plastic containers and release them after the butterflies have emerged from their chrysalis. I store the cocoons because I fear that the neighbor’s stray chickens would peck at them. The caterpillars are also at risk of getting pecked at and eaten but they can defend themselves—the pupae are generally defenseless.

Butterflies are fascinating. Caterpillars, though not as attractive as their adult selves, are also fascinating.  If you want butterflies in your area and you want to observe them from egg to adulthood, you can invite them. Yes, you can. Investing on flowering plants would entice the insects to visit you but, if you want them to breed in your area, I highly recommend planting their host plants. If you want a Citrus Swallowtail to visit, you should keep a citrus tree. A certain species has a certain food plant—have another plant for another butterfly species. Well, there are also other species with common hosts. 

I have observed several butterfly species in our area—six species are common visitors. If you want them in your area, I have listed their food plants—most of them I’ve discovered by luck. The rest I learned from the books and from my visit to the Jumalon Museum, Butterfly Sanctuary, and Art Gallery. 

1. Common Lime Butterfly (Papilio demoleus)

(Photo by WP User: Muhammad Mahdi Karim)

The Common Lime’s wings, viewed above, are black with a broad irregular yellow band running from forewing to hindwing. It also has a large number of irregular spots on the wing. As it ages, the yellow markings would deepen in to orange.  Its upper hindwing has a red tornal spot with blue edging around it.

This tailless swallowtail butterfly got its name from its host plant. Its food plants are from the Rutaceae and Fabaceae families. I have observed them lay their eggs in the lemonsito, pomelo and lemon trees in our area.  

2. Citrus Swallowtail (Papilio demodocus) 

(Photo by WP User: Muhammad Mahdi Karim) 

The Citrus Swallowtail is morphologically related to the Common Lime Butterfly. I myself get confused about the two species.  Looking at the hindwings, from the below, the Common Lime has more yellow while the Citrus Swallowtail has more black. 

The Citrus Swallowtail feeds on—of course—citrus tree leaves.  

3. Mottled Emigrant (Catopsilia pyranthe)

(Photo by WP User: J.M. Garg) 

The Mottled Emigrant is a medium sized butterfly of the family Pieridae.  It is found in South Asia, Southeast Asia and parts of Australia. It has chalky-white wings while other representatives have greenish or yellowish coloring. Its forewing is with or without a discocellular black spot, which varies in size. The hindwing is sometimes clear, but generally with a narrow terminal black spot at the apices of the veins.

The Mottled Emigrant feeds on legumes of the Cassia, Senna and Crotalaria genera. I've seen its caterpillars in our ill-tempered neighbor's dwarfed golden shower tree.

4. Common Mormon (Papilio polytes)

(Photo by Wikipedia/Rahul Natu)

The Common Mormon butterfly is a butterfly with a row of white spots along the middle part of hindwing. This species displays sexual dimorphism. The male has one form and the female has three forms. The form cyrus, the lease common of the three forms, is similar to the male, differing in that it always has strongly marked red crescents. The other two forms are stichius, which mimics the Atrophaneura aristolochiae, and cyrus, which mimics the Atrophaneura hector. 

The Common Mormons also feed on citrus trees. 

5. Tailed Jay (Graphium agamemnon)

The Tailed Jay is a common, tropical swallowtail butterfly species native to India, Sri Lanka through Southeast Asia and into Australia. The butterfly’s upper side wings are black with green spots.  

The Tailed Jay’s host plants are from the family Annonaceae. I recommend planting guyabano and atis/sugar-apple trees. You can also plant Indian mast trees—a tall tree, commonly found planted in the middle of the traffic islands of Mandaue. 

6. Common Jay (Graphium doson)

(Photo by WP User: J.M. Garg)

The Common Jay is a fast-flying swallowtail butterfly. On the upper side, it has black wings with pale blue semi-transparent central wing band that are formed by large spots. Around the wing band are smaller spots. The underside of the wings is brown with markings similar to upper side but whitish in color.

The Common Jay has similar food plants as the Tailed Jay. It also feeds on the plants of the Lauraceae and Magnoliaceae families. 

Before you run and go on planting the food plants, take note: butterflies are beautiful to look at but some of them are considered invasive species. Most people are abhorred of the squirmy caterpillar, especially the hairy ones. Their larvae are also considered pests. There is a high risk that the caterpillars will attack your other plants, especially those which are closely related to their food plants. Lastly, you do not want them around your crops. 

The Worst Images of All Were...

The sea is beautiful above. Below—I hope so.

I first read about Shell Horizons, Inc. last April while I was nosing around Twitter for the Willing Willie child abuse complaint. I do not watch Revillame’s show and I wasn’t able to see the episode where the alleged macho-dance occurred. One tweet led to another and to another tweet with a link to the Shell Horizons, Inc.’s website. The tweet said something like, ‘saving the Philippine seas from illegal coral mining.’

The homepage sports an old look that was common among the HTML-based sites of the late 90’s and early 2000’s.  It does have a small Flash clip.  The homepage advertises Shell Horizons, Inc. as the ‘US Largest Wholesaler of Seashells and Seashell Products Since 1976.’  The site’s counter also stated that it has been visited over 10 million times since 1998. I’d say the homepage design works—I got interested to view the rest of the pages.

I first started browsing their products and was surprised to see that they sold, aside from seashells, sea fans—a type of soft coral. I continued browsing around the products page but I never found out where they harvest their products.

I went to check on their contact information. It stated that they only use products from non-endangered species. Also found on the same page is a grainy image of Filipinos, with the shells, with a caption dedicated the families that make the shellcraft industry possible. The people in the picture were all smiles but something in the image brought about sadness. 

It was surprising to learn that an American company could exploit our Philippine seas and could get away with it. 

I was more surprised when I click on the ‘About Us’ page. It wasn’t like any other ‘About Us’ page, it was an image gallery. The images depicted include harvesting shells, cleaning the shells and the firm's finished products. There was also an image of a Christmas tree, made of shells, in the White House’s Palm Room. The worst images of all were—surprise, surprise— the hoards and hoards of corals. 

The First Day of School

Today is the first day of school in the public schools and some private schools. It’s the end of the beloved summer break. It is the end of the short-lived intersession. Today is the start of another grueling school year.

The first day of school is the most anticipated—if not the most dreaded day of the year.  For me, the day is mostly horrifying—good thing I’m already over school.

Back when I was a student, I wasn’t the type who anticipated the first day of school. Of course, I look forward to seeing my friends and classmates but there are a number of things I hate about the start of the academic year.

I hate the first day of school because it meant my days are longer and my nights shorter—early to bed, early to rise… Of course, I turn in early—I had to. Staying up late and waking up feeling tired would only make things worse.

Another hated thing, is finding out that my close friends are on a different section. If only I was able to choose my classmates. Well, in my high school alma mater, one could choose his/her classmates—if one enrolls late and by late, I mean, the classes have already started. I had a classmate who enrolled on the first day of class. The school administration gave her the option to pick her own section. She chose to join me and the rest of the unruly gang, even though our class had the school’s most dreaded teacher as an adviser. I don’t know if I would have made the same choice as her.

Finding out that your new adviser is the scary, ill-tempered, someone-who-is-ready-to-bite-you type is another thing—the infamous teacher known for screaming at her students. Me, I was never lucky when it comes to class advisers. I’m fine in having an ill-tempered subject teacher; at least, if I’m lucky, I only get to spend an hour a day with him/her. An adviser who runs a class in her own reign of terror? No way!

Lastly, the thing that I hated most in the start of the school year is the student introductions. The thought of introductions make me want to skip the first day or skip school entirely. If only I was allowed to tell the teacher, ‘Do I have to do this again? I know most of the class and most of them know me. Let the newbies introduce themselves to the class instead.’ I really dislike standing in front of the class to introduce my self—I dislike staying in front in general.

Join the June 8 Blog Action Day to Save our Coral Reefs and Seas!

I just signed up to join the June 8 Blog Action Day to Save the Philippine Coral Reefs and Seas. I would like to invite you guys to join us in this fight to protect our marine resources. Below is  an announcement from the Save the Philippine Seas website: 

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Our beautiful and diverse marine resources and wealth need your attention and your help. They are under attack.

Exploitative foreign firms, in tandem with local partners and left unchecked by irresponsible government officials, are illegally harvesting and peddling our precious coral reefs. In one case, coral reefs twice the size of Manila was destroyed, and the plunder continues.

We cannot accept this. We must act now to save what’s left of our coral reefs and to protect our seas so those beautiful and important natural resources are preserved for our and the next generations to enjoy.

We call on all Filipino bloggers, Tumblr and Posterous users, Tweeps, Plurkers and all netizens to join the June 8 International Blog Action Day to save our seas and coral reefs. Your voices, our actions are that important.

What we will do:

• Tweet, Plurk, or post to spread the word about this event: Share or repost this announcement (and please link back to the original post).
• Use the Twitter hashtag #reefwatchPH and/or #savePHseas.
• Spread the savephilippineseas.com URL.
• Display and share our official campaign badge.
• Register your website/blog to let us know that you’re joining our effort to spread the word — you’ll find the registration form on the sidebar of this site. If you’re using more than one site (no Facebook or Twitter URLs, please), register each of them separately.
• Most importantly, on June 8, join the Blog Action Day from your favorite social media channels (blog, Tumblr, Posterous, Twitter, Plurk, Facebook, etc.)

Some ideas and suggestions

While the issue is serious, there are a lot of creative ways to send our message across on or before June 8:

An open letter to officials and companies.

• A photo essay about your favorite beaches or dive spots.
• Design and share mini-posters, posters and drawings.
• If you grew up near a beach, tell us about your fond memories.
• Post about why your (future) kids and future grandkids ought to have the chance to see and enjoy our coral reefs and seas.
• Why harvesting and peddling corals is bad for the environment and is bad business.
• Proposals on how to protect or clean up our seas.
• If you belong to a clan, group, or organization, invite them to join the event.
• Taking an extra step or two won’t harm too. You may email your senator, congressman, the Environment secretary, and even the President to demand action.

NOW is the time to act

We can do this. Let’s make our social media work for something good. Let’s make the Philippine coral reefs, seas and the need to save them the trend – to raise awareness, to inspire action, to grow our communities, and to compel government action.

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Originally posted by Tonyo Cruz on the Save the Philippine Seas website.

Who’s Your Favorite X-Men Character?

I just recently watched X-Men: First Class. From the teasers, press releases and film trailers, I learned that the film would not be based on the X-Men: First Class comic series—I thought of not watching the film. Why can’t 20^th Century Fox make an X-Men film that is faithful to comics? Why do they have to mix up all the storylines? I told myself, don’t watch the film.

I, like most fans of the comics, only want the true history of the X-Men to be told. Fans are fans—they may rant about this and that but still they will watch the film. Me, I rant about the films not being faithful to the comics but I’ve never missed a single X-Men film.

Though I hate the film and writers for rewriting the X-Men history, I still watched the film because, finally, they are including two of my favorite X-Men in the film.

Who’s your favorite X-Men character? Who’s your favorite mutant? Do you even have a favorite X-Men character? Me, I have several favorites. Below are my favorite X-Men characters:

                                                                                                                                               

1.  Cyclops

Scott Summers is the elder brother of Havok and Vulcan.  As a young boy, Scott Summers is orphaned after watching his parents die in a plane crash. Scott and his brother, Alex, are the only survivors—they would later learn they have a third brother, Gabriel. Alex was adopted, but Scott was placed in an orphanage in Nebraska. He ran away when his powers manifested uncontrollably. His display of power attracted the attention of Charles Xavier. After getting rescued from the mutant criminal Jack O'Diamonds, Scott becomes the first member of the X-Men.

Cyclops possesses the mutant ability to project a beam of heatless ruby-colored concussive force from his eyes. He is also a skilled leader, martial artist and strategist.

2. Cable

Nathan Summers is the son of Cyclops and Madelyne Pryor. His birth was orchestrated by the geneticist Mister Sinister, who created his mother as a clone of the mutant telepath Jean Grey. The ancient mutant Apocalypse infected Nathan, with a deadly techno-organic virus, after learning that Sinister originally planned to use Nathan as a weapon against him. In order to save Nathan, he was sent to an alternate future of Earth-4935. After Stryfe—his enemy and clone—fled to the 20^th century, Nathan followed. He arrives in Scotland, years before his birth, and was taken in by Moira MacTaggert. He adopted the codename Cable. Cable was later sent to visit Charles Xavier in the US. Meeting the professor, Cable helped design the security system of the X-Men Mansion.

Cable was born with telepathic and telekinetic abilities; his psychic powers are used to restrain his techno-organic infection. He also has to ability to project mental energy blasts and of astral projection.

3. Banshee

Sean is a member of the famed Cassidy clan of Ireland.  He discovered his mutant powers as an adolescent but concealed them – partly because his wail spooked the superstitious elders of the community, who likened it to the ghostly banshees of Irish lore. After graduating from college, Sean went in to law enforcement and became an agent of the Interpol.  He was in Tennessee when Charles Xavier recruited Sean and several other mutants to form the second generation of X-Men to rescue the original X-Men team from the living island Krakoa.

Banshee's superhumanly powerful lungs, throat and vocal cords could produce a sonic scream for various effects, including flight and sonic blasts.

4. Jean Grey

Jean Grey was 10 years old when her mutant telepathic powers first manifested after experiencing the emotions of a dying friend. Her parents took her to be treated by Professor Charles Xavier. Jean was unable to cope with her powers, forcing Professor X to install psychic shields on her mind to prevent her from using her powers until she was mature enough to control them. Jean Grey was a founding member of the X-Men and the only female member of the original team. After a successful mission on a space station, the X-Men returned to the earth in a shuttle through a lethal solar storm. Dying from radiation poisoning, Jean was saved by the cosmic entity known as the Phoenix Force.  

Jean Grey is an Omega-level mutant with the telepathic and telekinetic abilities.  She is also one of the physical hosts of the Phoenix Force.

5. Havok

Alex is the Summers’ middle child. He and Scott survived the plane crash that killed their parents. Alex was adopted by the Blanding family, who had lost a son, while Scott remained comatose in a hospital. Alex’s mutant powers manifested during an encounter with the school bully—incited by Mr. Sinister. After Alex incinerated the bully, Sinister placed a psi-block upon Alex and her foster sister, who also witnessed the events that night. When Alex went on to study geophysics at college, he bumped in to the original X-Men, and learned that Cyclops is his brother. Alex was captured by Larry Trask and his Sentinels. Trask gave Alex the codename Havok and fashioned a costume for Alex to help him control his powers. Havok was rescued by the X-Men and officially joined the team.

Havok can absorb ambient cosmic energy and discharge it as plasma blasts, with a concentric circle pattern.