Today I shall take you for a walk in the park. At the edge of our housing estate, there is this ditch that is higher than you and me. Here, we fondly call it the big monsoon drain for without it our homes would certainly be flooded whenever there is a storm.
My neighbours, the residents who stay next to the ditch area have taken the initiative to create a garden and a green environment. Come, let me show you the way ........
First, here is the
Jetropha Integerrima, an evergreen small shrub with bright red and attractive flowers that can liven up any garden.
Next, we have the
Nerium Oleander plant, an evergreen shrub with beautiful pink flowers. It is one of the most poisonous plant in the world, so we adults will watch the children and teach them not to consume the leaves but they can admire its beauty.
Next comes the
Euphorbia Milii (Crown of Thorns or Christ Plant). Like many plants with lovely flowers, it has many torns. So, children, be careful when you want to pluck the pretty red flowers.
This is the Flower of Love (
Tabernaemontana corymbosa), another evergreen shrub. This plant is very frangrant. Okay, you can stop here to smell the flowers. It is healthy and blooming furiously now. I think it kind of look like our galaxy, The Milky Way when seen from afar.
Here's a row of
sugar cane plants. When I was a kid, they use to sell the cut stems which is about a foot long at the stalls. We buy them and even bring them into the cinema where we will bite and chew the flesh using our strong teeth and suck on the sweet juice. At home, we can boil the stems to make a sweet herbal drink. Out in town, there are roadside stalls equiped with pressing machines that sells cold sugar cane drinks to quench our thirst during a hot afternoon.
This is a
tapioca plant. We plant them for the roots which is dug out for culinary use. We can boil the tapioca and eat the flesh or use it to make deserts, chips and cakes. Look closely on the top left corner or click on the picture. Can you see McDonalds across the dicth?
These are pineapple plants. I guess they are still teenagers, so we have to wait at least a year and a half before we see any flowers and fruits.
Yes, a baby papaya plant living together with the
kangkong vegetable or ipomoea aquatica or water spinach. Papaya plants seem to love living at concrete corners, I don't know why. This kangkong vegetable can be stir fried with belacan (shrimp paste), a local favourite, which I like very much too.
This is one of the rosa-sinensis hybrids I photographed for my latest Wordless Wednesday post. Lovely, aren't they?
Finally, this is the blue daze (evolvulus glomeratus). The flowers are tiny but the they look very striking among the green leaves.
This little girl automatically stopped to pose for me when she saw me taking a photograph of the nerium oleander plant. She likes to come here in the mornings with her siblings and grandma. She is holding some rosa-sinensis hibiscus which she has earlier handpicked herself. I think she is a natural when it comes to modelling for me.
This is the place I come for a morning walk or jog. It is also the place where I have watched many beautiful sunrises. Besides the pictures here, other plants include the lemongrass, pandan, aloe vera, bougainvillea and bamboo.
Do you like this garden by the ditch?
This is my entry for Blooming Friday. My grateful thanks to Katarina at Roses and Stuff for hosting Blooming Friday. To see what others have posted or to participate, click here.
Update:
My New Straits Times article titled "Garden Makeover for a Ditch" was published on 13 March 2010, the link is
here.