My childhood attraction to Miniatures

My earliest memory of miniatures, is from when I was around three and a half years old, it's of these tiny mini green turtles which lived in the deepest green aquarium . The mini turtles were in the aquarium of my neighbor who was a girl of around six or seven.Sometimes I used to visit her at her apartment which was next to the UCLA housing building where we lived in Los Angeles. I remember I found it so amazing and fascinating to see these tiny living creatures swimming in their own little tiny green world. Along with the green mini turtles I also remember a little rubber bugs bunny that I had won in Las Vegas also when I was about three and a half years old. It was so cute, less than six inches tall. The girl who owned the turtles was a little bully and she took my bugs bunny away and I was so sad. I'm not sure why I didn't ask my parents to get it back for me though.

My other vivid memories of miniature fascination are from around six years of age onwards. Miniatures that fascinated me at that age ranged from the little flowers and green plants that grew in our garden to lady bird/bugs, mini rice fields, mini meals in mini pots and pans, to building my own mini neighborhood in clay in my backyard.

I remember when I was around six years old, how I was totally taken by the little plants that grew in the flowerbeds that ran around the front and on one side of our house. There were these little succulant plants that looked like some sort of miniature cactus. They were not really true cactus but could easily pass for cactus. I also remember we also used to have coleas growing there of the purple and yellow color and those had these tiny purple spikes of flowers growing out of them.

In the picture is myself with my younger brother and our Kitty in the front of our house with the garden that fascinated me so (circa 1974) . My front teeth are missing-click on the image for a closer view.

Our backyard was like a mini forest to me. It had some big trees such as mango, veralu (sri lankan olives), avacado and jackfruit. At the foot of the trees on the right side we used to have ala kola plants (a variety of taro plants which had huge leaves) they grew to about two feet tall. When it rained the raindrops used to get suspended on the leaves. To the left of the taro plants were a groundcover of tiny mukunuwenna leaves. The mukunuwenna leaves are very popular in Sri Lanka as a vegetable. This looked very much like a mini forest to me where the lady birds/bugs used to hide and appear sometimes to my delight.

Most of the lady bugs were the red variety with blackspots. However sometimes we used to visit my cousins who lived a few miles away at Lankatilleke where it was more rural. They used to have the most beautiful lady bugs in metallic colors mostly greenish gold. So my oldest cousin used to catch them for me and put them in a little pill bottle with a leaf inside and cover it with a piece of paper secured with a rubber band with holes punched in it so the lady bug could breathe. I was so happy with my treasure and took it home but unfortunately the lady bug always died in a few days and the mettalic color also tarnished once it died.