My Garden 11/16/2009
 
Everyone says gardening is good (for health).  I'm not sure.  I have been involved in it for a long time, from a small plot beside my house in the past to the present average sized garden (5,400sq feet) surrounding my house.  I am more involved in cleaning, watering and trimming.  My wife does the weeding and planting.  Both of us are having body ache all over due to gardening.  My brothers-in-law, who are older than us, have no body ache as they have no garden to bend over.  I feel like giving up the greens.  But then when the flowers are in full bloom we feel our efforts are worth it.
We have lots of palm trees - the royal palm, red palm, yellow palm, silver palm and one more which I do not know the name.  They are huge but they keep the garden cool.

Fruit trees.  A garden will not be complete without any fruit trees.  Our local papaya is a favourite.  It is cheap last time but is becoming more expensive now.  We grow a few papaya trees around our garden.  These provide us with free fruits now and then.  It is easy to grow and papaya tree do not need much attention except do not grow it next to or near a tall building or tree.  It will try to be as tall.

Another local favourite is the mango.  We have three varieties - the thai, indian and local apple mango which is sour and sweet.  The other two is very sweet.  During the fruiting season, which is now nearing the end, we have basketfull of mangoes.  There are still some fruits on the trees.
We are now very excited about one fruit which we have been waiting for months to bear fruit.  We bought the young plant in March, 2009 when we were up in Cameron Highland.  It started to flower at the end of September, 2009.  Now we have the first fruit.  Take a look at our PASSION fruit!
We love passion fruit.  We enjoyed this fruit in India which tasted sweet.
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enjoying our passion fruit in India
The golden or yellow variety is more suitable for our type of tropical climate.  I had read that the other variety is the purple passion fruit which grows well in sub-tropical areas and tastes better.
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I am 61 and my granddaughter is 9 years old.  One is growing old and the other is growing up.  The difference do not stop here.  Once when waiting in the car near the market I told her that if she went outside and scream and dance, people will say "oh how cute the girl is".  If I am to go out and do the same, people will say "oh that crazy old man".  She was amused.  Life is funny isn't it.

Life is like a roller coaster.  It takes time and effort to go up but can slide down with great speed.  I see my son start his working life as a lawyer struggling to survive.  Then I see him start a family and trying his best to provide for his family.  When the world economy collapsed he took the plunge by giving up his partnership in his law firm to become an employee in a mining firm in Indonesia.  I now see him on his way up.
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Years back we worry about our children growing up and their future.  Now they are grown up with their own family, we worry about their work and their health.  My daughter-in-law asked me once when only do we stop worrying about our children.  I told her that as long as we are around we will worry about them.  What a life.
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Home 11/02/2009
 
Swimming:  I have been swimming for a numbers of years.  I started swimming during my school days but only take it seriously about 3-4 years back.  Now I swim 3 times a week at the swimming club near my house.

The life guard is an old man of 70+ who is also a good coach.  When I started swimming at the club I had too many faults - this is the result of self learning without a coach.  But I'm lucky to have free coaching from him - maybe to make life easier for him then having to watch over me.  Anyway, for about a year the only thing I did at the pool is to hang on to the float and kicked from one end to the other.  After this he thought me the stroke - breast stroke and freestyle.  Now I swim 500-600 meters each time.




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