VEGETABLES NOT FOR SALE

Brinjal or egg plant in my tiny vegetable plot.

Bitter gourds on the fence.
Vegetables in the market were getting quite expensive since last year so I decided to plant some of my own. I have a really tiny piece of land ( don't even know if I can say that, maybe a tiny space will be more appropriate) in the back of the house. I started with digging out the stones and mixing the hard clay soil with bags of potting mixture and vegetable waste. I actually had to go buy and PAY for organic fertiliser - processed chicken and goat "poo" pellets. Does this strike an idea for anyone to venture into an export business to Malaysia? Ohh...the dried pellets were OK but once they got wet, they looked exactly like how chicken and goat "poo" should look like. I am a city girl, was I suppose to know that? I got more potting mix to cover the mess.


My better half, seeing my enthusiasm in the vegetable plot, gave me an assortment of gardening tools for our wedding anniversary. I was thinking of something a little bit more romantic for our 19th anniversary, instead I got a spading fork, shears, weeder, gloves and packets of seeds. GismoMan, being the expert in gadgets and not gardening, bought seeds for peas, capsicum, carrots and salad, stuff which I think are not going to make it in this really hot 30 - 35 C temperature. Surprisingly, the peas have sprouted but the rest are having much difficulty germinating.


Every day I am out there watering, digging and mixing the soil. It's a really cheap way to get off the excess pounds cos' its a sauna out there even in the evenings. Now that the beans and gourds are growing, the pests are enjoying the fruits of my labour. Chemicals are a definite "No, No" and GismoMan suggested using ginger, chilli or tumeric mixed in water as natural pesticides (something he read). The chilli made my hands all hot and swollen, the tumeric stained them a yellow as bright as the monks' robes and I got a back ache bent over pounding ginger for juice. Does anyone know a simpler form of natural fertiliser?


I shouldn't complain as I have already start eating my own produce. But, the salad leaves are slightly bitter, not sweet like the ones from the supermarket, the brinjals are puny and the okra so fibrous, MartianGirl just kept chewing at the dinner table until the rubber bands in her braces snapped. GismoMan was very supportive, "Maybe you should not mix the bitter gourds with the other vegetables, the bitterness probably gets transfered."


Something's not quite right but I will not admit defeat. We Asians have this saying, "Never say die." My tomatoes and peas should be fruiting in about a month and then, there will be another story.


Pea, salad, chillie and tomato seedlings.
Four-angle beans.