‘To plant a garden is to dream of tomorrow’.
– British actress, Audrey Hepburn.
Goggle defines a garden as a piece of ground adjourning a house in which grass, flowers and shrubs may be grown.
Do you have a garden, my friend? And what do you grow in it?
To me, the size of a garden does not matter so long as I can plant some vegetables that I can eat sometimes and flowers that I can admire everyday.
I am writing about gardens this week because I am spending a lot of time in mine lately.
My backyard was given a long overdue makeover recently because of the need to repair the broken drains there.
Alas, all the old trees including the mulberry trees — that never failed to flower and bore fruits all year round — had to go.
The conscientious contractor did a good job. He put big pipes in the drains and then put cement over them. He pulled out all the roots of all the trees and levelled the ground.
We also asked him to repair the torn down fence that separated our yard from that of a neighbour.
My son even asked him to lay some pavement slabs so that we could walk in the garden without getting our feet dirty.
After the contractor had finished his job, my garden looked really brand new. It did not look like my old untidy garden anymore.
“Don’t plant anything anymore,” my son told me.
I looked at him but did not say anything.
I think what he meant was “Don’t grow any big trees anymore in the garden.”
You see, we discovered during the renovation work that some roots of trees like the banana trees had penetrated deep into the soil and caused some damage to the septic tanks.
When she was alive, my mother loved to plant banana trees. ‘Pisang abu’, the bananas she planted were suitable for fritters.
All the kids who grew up in the house looked forward to the banana fritters. We also shared our bountiful harvests with our neighbours.
Sometimes the banana trees were so tall that they almost touched the electric wires at the back of the house. That was when we had to cut them down and make traditional family dishes out of them.
During the recent makeover, the banana trees were the first to be chopped down.
Ideally, trees should be grown far from septic tanks. But if you live in a terraced house like me, it is something that is hard to avoid because the garden is quite small and often located near the septic tanks.
After the garden makeover, we had to seek the help of the Kuching South City to pump out the water which was very high in the septic tank and pay another contractor to clear the blocked pipes inside the septic tanks.
By now, my garden is not empty anymore. Instead, I have many pots of tomato plants, a pot of ‘serai’ (lemon grass) and a few pots of chilli plants there now.
I also have many plastic containers with tomato plants in them.
Not so long ago, before the garden makeover, my younger sister threw many tomato seeds in a box and since then, many plants have sprung up and are now waiting to be transplanted.
In my entire life, I have never owned so many tomato plants and I guess, in life, there’s always a first time for everything to happen.
My best friend is already preparing me for a bumper tomato harvest.
“Get ready to sell some. Surely, you cannot eat them all yourself,” she said.
Normally, I will eat the tomatoes I pluck fresh from the garden. I guess I will cross the bridge when I come to it. Right now, I need to prune, water and feed them consistently.
I find tomatoes — and other plants as well — need tender loving care. You need to touch them and talk to them every day.
Usually, I water my plants with rice water. Yes, the cloudy liquid can nourish plants.
In two empty plastic containers, I have just planted some green vegetables called ‘pak choy’, lady fingers and brinjals.
The seeds have been with me for a few months. I got them free from a shop that was selling many household items.
I hope the seeds will germinate so that I can add to the collection of plants in my brand new garden.
Gardening is a fun and rewarding hobby for me. As I work in the garden, I get my supply of Vitamin D.
All the digging, planting and weeding also help burn my calories and strengthen my heart.
Gardening reduces stress and helps me inprove my hand strength. I am also getting fresh produce that I know has not been treated with pesticides.
What about you, my friends?
