A post without giant spider pictures, I promise.

Remember Tucker and the Monster?

I got some complaints for that one - I roped you in with cute pictures of the adorable gecko Tucker then BAM! pictures of a Huntsman spider with legs like pencils.  I was afraid that thing was going to have Tucker for breakfast - which is not an exaggeration, in South Africa, they are known as Lizard Eating Spiders - and then I'd really be alone.

Well, I'm not going to do that to you again.  You'll just have to trust me when I say that the beastie currently camped out over its (Mom: skip the next few words and continue after the next set of parenthesis) walnut-sized egg sack (Continue:) in the corner of my bedroom is by far the largest one I've seen yet.  It's Monster 2.0.  Now, I'm not naturally arachnophobic, but that first one about did me in.  Over time however, I really have gotten used to them. Though they're lightening fast and the sudden movement can be startling, they're more likely to be running away from you than towards.  Huntsmans are also just that, hunters (not weavers), and because their diet includes cockroaches, that's as good a reason as any to let them stay.  

The only thing that really concerns me are my geckos. Because I love them so, and I already had to watch one itty bitty baby gecko get dispatched by a hoard of ants back in Lila, and I never want to see that again.  A gecko in the jaws of a Huntsman would be a sad sight indeed.

However, my other new housemate might just be able to fend for herself, and maybe even make that enormous spider into her own lunch.

That's right folks, if we have Monster 2.0, then we also have Tucker 2.0.

I have a Tuko:

For those of you who don't know, Tukos, or Tokay Geckos, are large, aggressive lizards native to Southeast Asia.  They can grow to be over a foot long, and common lore here holds that they can take a finger off, but apparently they're more likely to just clamp down on said finger for an hour (but might be convinced to let go with a little waterboarding).  Tukos are threatened here in the Philippines for the same reason many organisms are - a lucrative illegal trade to the rare-species-gobbling markets of China and Japan.  Try to take one out of the country and you'll be slapped with a $20,000  fine or 12 years in jail. Theoretically. Because big Tukos are worth several thousand dollars anyway, people still risk it, and do so successfully. 

Another part of the allure of the Tuko is their call.  It's worth a trip to the Philippines...or this Wikipedia page... to hear to what I'm talking about.  Before I had ever seen a Tuko or even knew what they were, I would hear them at night on the rooftops surrounding my host family's house in Lila.  The sound, a frenetic jarring of the night, baffled me for months.  I couldn't for the life of me picture what would make that sound, and finally settled on an image of a giant exotic bird much like Kevin from Up.  But no, it was no rare bird with flamboyant plumage and impressive lung capacity, but lizards.  Amazing. 

So as you can imagine, I'm grateful one has decided to hang out with me here in Clarin.  She's only about six inches long, and remarkably beautiful and calm.  If she wandered into my bedroom and took care of that little spider issue, I wouldn't be devastated either.