Arowanas have this veil of mystery over them. My first encounter with an arowana was more than two decades ago. It was at a clinic near my home. The waiting room had a large aquarium housing an arowana. As I sat there waiting for my turn, I watched the fish as she circled nonchalantly in the aquarium. I have been fascinated by that sight since.

On November 18, 2006, Wuan and I visited the Aquafair Malaysia 2006 at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre with our good friends William and Cynthia. We took home a Red-Tailed Golden Arowana exhibited by King Kong Aquarium from Melaka. At that time, the fish was only six inches in length and cost RM650 after some hard bargaining.

She has since grown to nine inches. In the initial weeks after we brought her back, she subsisted mostly on shrimps. We noticed that her anal fin and the bottom portion of her caudal fin sport a pleasant shade of red whenever she goes on a shrimp diet. Shrimps are her favourite food. Apart from shrimps, she eats mealworms and crickets.

I have grown fond of her. During the week days when Wuan is at work, she is my only companion. Her aquarium is just behind where I spend almost the entire day with the laptop. Whenever my nerves are frazzled, I would just turn back and watch her. The sight of her unhurried swimming is therapeutic indeed.

In this blog, we hope to chronicle our journeys with her. It would be interesting to see if we can learn anything from this fish that they call the dragon. Arowanas can live up to anywhere from ten to twenty years. We hope that she will be with us for many years to come. This is the beginning of our yet unnamed arowana’s story.

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