Not to be confused with "ananas", which may also be found in trees, anabas is a genus of tree-climbing fish (such as the climbing perch of SE Asia) whose name, in Greek, simply means "going up". The Greek "ana" meaning "up", "back" or "again" gives us a host of words from the familiar ("analyse", "anagram") to the highly technical ("anacathartic", "anaclastic"). Its opposite, "kata", meaning "down", is possibly even more productive, although while "anode" and "cathode" form a pair, sadly "anastrophe" is not the opposite of "catastrophe" but rather the use of an unusual or surprising word-order in a sentence.

The anabas on his way up the tree may be said to be in the act of "anabasis", or "going up", although this word in English is usually reserved for a military advance into Anatolia by Cyrus the Younger. Being unsuccesful, he was forced to beat a hasty catabasis back to Persia.