I was given a small patch of earth to garden, and chose seeds to plant. I remember picking Shirley poppies and Love Lies Bleeding, but I don’t remember them actually growing. I also remember going to play with another little girl from school who lived round the corner. Her mother asked if we would like some strawberries. Would I? Yes! To my amazement, she took us down their little council house garden to rows and rows of strawberry plants, all neatly bordered and supported with straw. I’d never seen anything like it, and the big bowl of strawberries was amazing. We could only afford apples when I was a child, occasional oranges and very rarely a banana.
When I was small I had a little patch but all I can remember was aubretia. When I was in my teens my mother said we had to weed a wheel barrow of weeds at the start of the summer holidays. I hated it, didn't know what was a weed. I remember when I was 16 I got my boyfriend to do it for me, he worked in a garden centre.
I married when I was 21 and we bought our first house, 1973. I hadn't a clue, though I got pretty good at wallpapering and painting! My lovely Mother in law came to stay. She was a garden enthusiast. She taught me how to weed and what plants were called. We walked up and down the local streets together and she told me what people had planted in their front gardens. I wrote down the names of plants I liked and we went and bought them and planted them. I got the gardening bug.
Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
> @Jac19 ... A former colleague was from Sri Lanka ... she had been orphaned > by the trouble there and was adopted and came to live in the UK. When she > grew up she became a Children's Social Worker which is when we worked > together ... eventually she went back to Sri Lanka to work with orphans there.
That is a nice thing to do, both the adoption and what she chose to do to give back.. Those troubles are in the past now, Dove. The war ended and there has been peace in the country for over a decade now.
On rubber trees they carve a kind of spiral trough in the outer bark of the main tree about 2 feet high, starting about hip high. There is a fine art to it because, if you cut too deep, you harm the growth of the tree or you can kill it. At the bottom of the trough you put a cup -- a half coconut cup is ideal -- and sap drips and collects in it.
In the mornings a plantation boy goes around and collects all the rubber into a bucket.
Then one takes it to a smokehouse (we had about 3) in the plantation and they put some chemicals in it and pour them into like trays. They are left in these trays for a certain amount of days, and then hung in the smokehouse and smoked. The slabs come out of there ready to go into mixes that make like car tyres, among other things.
Grandfather used to then take them to the Colombo port to sell to vendors there for export.
The call of the 2/3 cockerels grandfather had waked us up at dawn, but the boys were out and about collecting rubber sap already. I would run behind them in rubber flip-flops, collecting a few into a small toy bucket.
My grandfathers grew cashew, coconut, and cinnamon in the plantations for export, too. Rice paddies and vegetables for the family and for local sales.
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To my amazement, she took us down their little council house garden to rows and rows of strawberry plants, all neatly bordered and supported with straw. I’d never seen anything like it, and the big bowl of strawberries was amazing. We could only afford apples when I was a child, occasional oranges and very rarely a banana.
I married when I was 21 and we bought our first house, 1973. I hadn't a clue, though I got pretty good at wallpapering and painting! My lovely Mother in law came to stay. She was a garden enthusiast. She taught me how to weed and what plants were called. We walked up and down the local streets together and she told me what people had planted in their front gardens. I wrote down the names of plants I liked and we went and bought them and planted them. I got the gardening bug.
> by the trouble there and was adopted and came to live in the UK. When she
> grew up she became a Children's Social Worker which is when we worked
> together ... eventually she went back to Sri Lanka to work with orphans there.
That is a nice thing to do, both the adoption and what she chose to do to give back.. Those troubles are in the past now, Dove. The war ended and there has been peace in the country for over a decade now.
In the mornings a plantation boy goes around and collects all the rubber into a bucket.
Then one takes it to a smokehouse (we had about 3) in the plantation and they put some chemicals in it and pour them into like trays. They are left in these trays for a certain amount of days, and then hung in the smokehouse and smoked. The slabs come out of there ready to go into mixes that make like car tyres, among other things.
Grandfather used to then take them to the Colombo port to sell to vendors there for export.
The call of the 2/3 cockerels grandfather had waked us up at dawn, but the boys were out and about collecting rubber sap already. I would run behind them in rubber flip-flops, collecting a few into a small toy bucket.
My grandfathers grew cashew, coconut, and cinnamon in the plantations for export, too. Rice paddies and vegetables for the family and for local sales.
Not my picture.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.