SINGAPORE – Make family time all the more special with these ideas and activities.
Read Harry Hippo’s Holiday picture book
Have you heard about Congo the Nile hippopotamus who escaped from the Singapore Zoo in 1974? He made front-page headlines and stayed in the news for several weeks after he took off from his enclosure and enjoyed a long break in Upper Seletar Reservoir.
Congo’s adventure is now retold in picture book Harry Hippo’s Holiday. Author Alan John says: “It was so hard to believe that you could lose a 3.5-tonne hippopotamus and not recapture it for 47 days.”
This is his fourth collaboration with illustrator Quek Hong Shin. Like their previous titles – The One And Only Inuka (2018), Ubin Elephant (2021) and Grandma’s Tiger (2022) – the latest is also based on animals that have made the news in Singapore over the years.
“This is just a series of children’s picture books, but it’s also a record of minor events in Singapore that might otherwise be forgotten,’ John says.
“I keep meeting people who did not know an elephant once turned up on Pulau Ubin or that a tiger might have swum across from Malaysia.”
He adds: “Singapore has this surprising side of nature bursting through the urban landscape, with pythons that pop up everywhere, otters who create havoc in fancy koi ponds, and that tapir that is spotted sometimes in Tampines. We have to pause and notice, and tell the children, “Look!”
This post was originally published on here
