When we first looked at the house in Jakarta, Indonesia, the agent said that the garden would be 'tidied up'. It was hard to see what they would tidy. There was more pool than garden and tall, desperately ugly walls.
The back garden boasted a smallish frangipani (Plumeria obtusifolia) by the shaded terrace, a banana palm (Musa acuminata), a group of three Veitch palms (Veitchia merrilli) and a lone hibiscus adorning the 3-metre plus wall behind the pool. Against the house there was a clump of Macarthur palm (Ptychosperma macarthuri) in one corner & a large shrub (Ixora coccinea) in another.
The front garden had more grass, a row of yellow-flowered Cassia fistula, another Ixora, a papaya (Carica papaya), a palm and some magnificent Collins or hanging heliconia (Heliconia collinsiana). The window boxes were bare and a sole hibiscus adorned the house wall.
The 'tidy up' occurred, however, and we arrived to a garden where a machete had halved the hibiscus and a scorched earth policy been applied! The trees and Heliconia remained but that was about all.
So it was an all-new experience, shopping for plants in a country where stalls are more the norm than shops and the plant nursery was in fact a series of open-air stalls strung out along the street.
Located right on the busiest streets, on the premise that traffic attracts sales, these plant stalls were a haven of green, resembling a roadside garden. Dense traffic, incredible fumes and the children waiting at home usually conquered the temptation to stop and buy.
Investigating the nursery stock was interesting; the plants were unnamed, densely packed in and the vendors were very keen to sell, always at a good price (proclaimed to be their 'best' price for the day!) It took time until I became familiar enough to buy with the confidence that I knew what I was getting, and in the meantime I had loads of fun discovering!
There were several of these nurseries not far from our house - my favourite was on Jl. Prapanca, just south of the central city. I learnt to bargain and paid progressively less for our plants as my Indonesian and my bartering skills improved. After being assured that the vendor was giving me a very special deal, we would progress to reduce the exorbitant price to something more acceptable, suggesting they threw in another 'worthless' plant to round off the deal! Buying several of the same plant from the same vendor, piled together on the roadside, resulted in the best deals.
The plants themselves were new to me; I had always gardened in a temperate climate. These lush tropicals, flamboyant flowers and bold foliage plants were great fun to work with. I planted sweeps of plants for the first time and was won over to this style of planting.
Getting the plants home was always fun, sitting with a huge fern on the backseat, plants poking out of the boot was not at all unusual. A palm was still a challenge, as my visiting sister pointed out when I bartered for a rather tall example.
"How will you get it home?", she wondered. "Shhh, give me a minute", I said, and accepted,” Your price but transport included", for the palm and pink frangipani that would never have ever fitted into the car. Minutes after the deal was struck we saw our new, near 3-metre palm whizzing by, sticking out of a bajaj, or three wheeled bike-taxi! Typically of Indonesian ingenuity, the palm was growing in a large plastic laundry bucket!
Certainly a different experience to the suburban garden centre, but no less fun with wonderful tropicals all waiting for a home...
Tales out of the ordinary and those of gardeners just like you! We bring you stories of joy and accomplishment, moments of despair and triumph. All in a gardener's life!
The challenge: more pool than garden and desperately ugly walls
Jakarta plant market on the edge of a busy Jalan Prapanca
Jakarta plant market: a green oasis
Special delivery by bajaj
Wonderful tropicals all waiting for a home, here, frangipani
