Visiting
the gardens made him sad again. He promised to take his mother here to
see flowers from all over the world. Didn’t he mention to her that
they have olive trees? She loved to use olive oil for her youthful
skin. Yes, her skin looked youthful even when she was dying. Yes he
did mention it to her. The dwarfed trees remind him of her.
And
for a while he forgot about it when he saw white lilies and tiger
lilies. The flowers produce strong, woody smell. He thought the
blooms were sprinkled with sawdust but when seen closely, it was the
pollen. He once again got distracted by the chance of finding roses
of Sharon, a kind of hibiscus. The name sounds beautiful to his ears.
Then he found out that camellia can grow so tall. Nevermind the
pungent smell, the flowers look so showy. And its leaves look like
those of tea.
It
rained outside and he was raining inside. He was sad that she would
never be here to see everything that looks so bright, so beautiful.
The gardens are lovely. If he could imagine what Eden—sans
domes—might have looked like, here it is. But then there is Eden
Project in Europe.
Gardens
are said they boost longevity. S thought, the Chinese proverb is
true: if you want to be happy for a week, cook a swine. A month, get
married. For life, tend a garden.
His
mother never liked flowers that much. She only planted edible plants.
But she did admire them, like bunga rias (a kind of torch ginger, a
food flavoring), domiana (a herb with red appearance, thought to have
medicinal purposes), and banana flowers (which she cleverly cooked
and served with sambal). He remembered that one day, like months
before they moved to Jalan Hamid Rusdi, she gave him Rp500 to buy a
small orchid in order to make him happy. And she even transformed her
front garden in Java with bright red florets of roselle which aroused
the neighborhood’s curiosity.
Outside
of the glass domes, it was raining and he was still raining inside.
The sickly sweet smell of tea hybrid roses made him even more sad. He
remembered, his mother let a pot of rose grow. Perhaps as a gesture
of remembrance. Her mother—his grandmother—used to distill and
sell rose water in the market.
But
then he remembered, she is already in Eden now. The real Eden. Eden
sans domes. Not only flowers, she will find fruits also and animals.
It is where lambs are playing with lions.It's where hummingbirds are abundant, so are butterflies. He's sure, she is happy there.
