10/X/2025
We grew up listening to bedtime stories, fables, parables, and
fairytales in our childhood. Guess who used to ‘podcast’ them? None other than
my father. He could narrate so many stories but one used to be my favourite.
Time and again I would request him to repeat it. You knew each character and
their characteristics by heart. But still……
Jack & the beanstalk was that favourite story. I would wait for the
part when the ogre would cry out loud. I would repeat the same, half asleep,
half afraid, as dad would gruffly say “FEE-FAI-FO-FUM, I smell the blood of an
Englishman. Be alive, or be dead. I’ll have his bones to grind my bread…...”
One would imagine the state of Jack because you thought you were jack.
By the time Jack would get the golden egg, you were fast asleep dreaming
of chopping the huge bean stalk, slaying the giant ogre, and living happily
thereafter. Dad too would be snoring by then as he lay with me in bed.
Today, I was looking at a few vines growing in our garden. I took a
pause to admire them. So many passers by praised the way they had been trained
over our garage. The arch they made at the entrance and the beautiful red, pink
and white flowers that grow on it.
One of them is a wild one, which was already there when we shifted to
this house. This year we did not trim it and let it grow. It has reached the
first floor of the house and is still growing. The way it is spreading is
turning out to be a beauty.
The main vine with colourful flowers is the Hummingbird vine. From a
seed which is black in colour and smaller than a grain of Basmati rice, has
turned into something which one always wanted it to be. With just a small
support to begin with, now it has grown gigantically, even slipping out of the
gaps in the tiles.
Now, everyone in the colony wants it. The usual questions, from where
did you get it? How do you grow it? What is the soil mix? How do you care for
it? and so on. I bought the seeds on an online portal. They just don’t believe
it, I don’t know why.
When I tell them that it is a no fuss plant, they say, it can’t be. “Aap
hume batana nahi chahte.” Is ke Beej dena, is the usual talk. I handed over
some to a few of them but the feedback was that they didn’t sprout. One had
half a mind to tell them to read the story of Jack and the beanstalk, then they
will.
This vine is supposed to be grown in the ground, however we have it in
pots. That too becomes a matter of discussion with so many people. They always
say, it is not possible. Well, the results are there for them to see.
What I don’t reveal is the secret. I planted them in June, just after
the first pre monsoon rain. The progress was slow, but inch by inch it grew. It
is almost mid October and it has become lush.
Let me share the secret also. Overtime, the pot got root bound. As the
“fitrat” of a plant is that from the bottom holes the roots over grew and got
implanted into the soil. There was enough manure rich soil for it to feed on,
thus its good health.
Roots of this vine got embedded, found good food and grew like a Complan
Boy/girl. I fed it with nutrient rich water from our fish tubs from time to
time. The result is beyond imagination.
I only hope that when I climb by the vine, I do not have to fight the
demon, just get a bag of gold, a golden egg and the goose that lays that golden
egg. With age, it is difficult to climb so high up the vine.
The vine is at its pinnacle now but as winters would set in, it will
perish being seasonal. Another vine called the passion flower vine has caught
hold of it and is now spreading along with it. The tender hummingbird vine has
solidified into a rope like structure and can support a lot of weight. I will
let the other one climb and see how things go.
A small seed can transform into such a huge vine which is still growing.
I am spreading its seeds in the common garden across our home so that next year
they spread more happiness. Butterflies, bees, insects, birds, especially
Hummingbirds are enjoying every bit of it.
Fee-Fai-Fo-Fum, have you guys heard the Hummingbird hum and grown this
vine at home? I wonder!!!!!!
JAI HIND
©® NOEL
ELLIS
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