Bugs of Childhood Past
a series of illustrations capturing the sights and memories of young-me interacting with the once abundant insect life in Surabaya. Now every year I come back to visit home, there is less and less of them. With insect life disappearing at an alarming rate worldwide, i wish to preserve these memories into images, in case they will be gone forever.
Every raining season you'd see 'laron' swarming the lamps, It was like snow fluttering in the air but never falling. Until the next morning the ground sparkles with millions of shed wings.
Kalamangga (Golden orb weavers) starts swarming on the electric powerlines when you go higher up in the mountains in East Java
Kolam ikan - small fishponds dotted throughout the neighborhood often offer a glimpse of what lurks in the large lakes. Small tadpoles, freshwater snails, and many aquatic larvae of flying insects each go about their day in this submerged metropolis.
Ikan gatul (guppies) and Kepiting Yuyu (rice Paddy crab), two common denizens in Surabaya sewers.
