Better Than My GrandMother’s Garden

My husband rearranged our living room so that I am able to play the keyboard while facing my garden. What a wonderful way to spend the morning,  watching  two bluejays and a woodpecker hop from my papaya trees to the citrus tree and the fence.  That’ s why no matter what the hubby says I will never do away with my cherished plants and trees in my humble suburban garden.  

Of the growing things in my garden that infuse me with daily pleasures  there are my two malunggay plants that I grew from seed. Despite the poor soil, these babies of mine have grown up.  They’re both tall and leggy.  The one in the pot has fewer but larger leaves and the one on the soil has  leaves that are narrower in shape.



I almost denuded one of my babies. It has only a few leaves left.
First harvest of malunggay for my monggo beans with kalabasa (squash). Hubby cooked it so the kalabasa  got mushy and saturated the soup making it sweet.





Look at my two papaya trees that also grew from seed.  I intend to chop off the tallest one to stimulate growth at a more accessible height.



My citrus tree to the right and my potted money tree that hasn’t stopped growing.



And my alugbati , the newest kid on the block.  To its left is my tangglad (lemongrass) which is all but devoid of leaves from spicing our tinolang manok and monggo with kalabasa for the past weeks. 

I also have kamote vine growing in a pot and more on the way, perfect for tinola nga isda.  I have all the ingredients for tinola nga manok in my garden except for the luy-a (ginger) and of course the chicken.  Shout out to my sister in Australia who raises “free-range chicken”, and who, by the way has an extensive vegetable garden that will put me to shame. She’s growing broccolis, cauliflowers, tomatoes, eggplants, potatoes, beans, celery, spinach, bokchoy,parsely, basil… the list is long.

In retrospect, despite the profusion of fruit trees around the house I grew up in back home, there was not any of these vegetables.  We had banana and coconut, guava and santol, mango and several tar apple trees and iba and guayabano  and some flowering trees like the gardenia and crepe myrtle back then, but strangely, no vegetables. When it comes to this, for an Ilongga living  abroad it is amazing to think that I am growing  more Filipino vegetables than my old folks back then...better than my grandmother’s garden.