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This summer has brought about satisfactory results in
my garden. After typhoon Milenyo two years ago when a very battered
garden could hardly respond to the summer sun and its heat for
blooming and fruiting, this is indeed a happy summer.
First, my Palawan Cherry trees
are awash in pink and white blooms filling whole branches with
flowers to the exclusion of leaves. They are way up the tree and
make a contrast to the blue sky we have early in the morning before
the afternoon thunderstorms cloud it and the rains pelt down.
Next, my chico tree near the gate
has produced its best crop of chico fruit ever. They were picked
while still firm lest the bats get them ahead and ripened naturally
and satisfactorily so as to be firm and sweet simultaneously. The
gardener says it is because he fertilized it during the last rainy
season.
Alas, my macopa is still in a
tantrum after having been badly mauled by Milenyo but I do detect
late blooms arising so perhaps we may have a late crop of macopas
after all.
Meanwhile, a bumper crop of
Indian mangoes and santol is on the way.
Some trees have showed
appreciation for summer conditions by blooming more than usual like
the Golden Shower which has quite a number of chandelier-like yellow
flowers, and the palosanto which has erupted in modest blooms. They
are still spikes but I hope they will turn into striking red
cone-like flowers as they do in the Canlubang Golf Club every
year.
Ginger flowers including torch
ginger which come from very tall stems are busy blooming and
providing cutflowers for the flower vases. The santan have already
had their run and now we are waiting for the kalachuchi to produce
flowers.
Over in my Baguio garden, the
jacarandas are in bloom with many spikes turning the air around the
trees to some sort of lilac blue. The bougainvilla is very vivid red
or violet and the yellow bells, bottlebrush and climbing roses are
in a riotous display of colors. The avocado tree is into its second
crop of tasty fruit and there is a banana bunch soon to mature. And
wonder of wonders, among my seven coffee trees which produced about
six kilos of coffee beans, there is a persimmon tree loaded with
incipient fruit. I say “incipient” because they have never yet
reached maturity but fall off before. This time we will spray them
with a mix of crushed neem leaves soaked in water and hope that the
little pests that block their growth will be brought under control.
In the meantime, the dark glossy exquisitely shaped persimmon leaves
are a joy.
Something odd is happening in the
Baguio market with regard to fruits. In April it was awash with
oranges which I first took to be a variety of navel oranges, only
much sweeter and juicier and which I presumed were imported from
somewhere. I found out later that they were billed as Sagada oranges
and selling between P70 and P90 a kilo. A kilo contained about three
oranges. It was with a feeling of fulfillment and patriotism that I
set about buying them and consuming them as well as calling
attention of others for their good taste, juicy sweetness and
attractive skin color.
The first week of May a friend
went to the Baguio market to buy the Sagada oranges which I had
advertised. She found and bought them, and on her way out someone
offered her Sagada grapes which she promptly bought, hearing for the
first time that there were grapes from Sagada. When she asked me to
taste them I told her they must be California or Chilean grapes
because that was their previous incarnation in my experience. The
next day more friends out of curiosity went to market and asked the
vendors where the grapes came from. Some said Sagada. But others
said, there were no Sagada grapes, certainly not the ones being sold
as such in the market. Moreover, that the so-called Sagada oranges
were from China! There are Sagada oranges but there is only one crop
yearly and it is not as abundant as the current oranges for sale are
which have been in the market for months now.
I cannot figure out what this
misnaming means except to mislead in order to sell. If both oranges
and grapes are not of a Sagada provenance but imported as I am
beginning to suspect, this will be a new twist to the local and
imported dichotomy. Usually imported is considered a selling point
and local a second choice.
Somebody tell me what is
happening this summer at the Baguio market.
miongpin@yahoo.com
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