Work inbox, 1/7/21. Phase 1B (first responders/LE) in NY get a perk. Even if I wasn't at the Dome. And words to live by from the commissioner. Four years more with the agency!

Traveling Light

DRUG SLANG CAN BE colorful. I was in the middle of working on this piece when COVID-19 struck, and the project was delayed for months because I had to work the reality of the pandemic into it. Of course, racial discrimination and homelessness among Pinoys in the U.S. have always been there, though largely unwritten about. So this narrative exercise, a product of this year's growing season, is for kabayans who are the lowest of the low: the homeless, undocumented, discriminated against and diseased drug addicts. One can have it all, I think. Thanks to the Mary Evans Picture Library for The Ignis Fatuus drawing (1860).

The Good Bride

AND THERE SHE IS. Not in a sham marriage but one with a hairy roasted wild boar. "Although the courtship period has a varied set of rules and ceremonials, the marriage itself is as simple as possible. After the consent of the parents has been obtained, the unceremonious first sleep of both the spouses together is considered as wedlock itself," according to Mangyan Heritage Center. And true to her nature as a shy, self-effacing Mangyan girl, she chooses a quiet life deep in the jungle, far from the prying eyes of land-hungry lowlanders.

The groom was waiting

And here came the bride

This hidden wedge high up the branches seemed like the spot

Where she could make a happy home, singing an ambahan. Maybe to a baby?

Ako gabay putyukan

Ako dayo mangaptan

Baliti nan gubayan

Nakan kis-ab sugutan 

Bunglo kasagunsunan

Ho bay si dis mangaptan

Sa sanga panulusan

Bilog bag-o sangbayan

I'm a common honeybee.

I don't want to settle down

at the side of the fig tree.

The reason: because I saw

many marks of ownership.

The place where I'll settle down

is a branch close to the top.

Only there will I be glad.

                    

                    --Ambahan 216 ("Marriage" from Treasure of a Minority, trans. by A. Postma)

Bridget The Midget And Goliath

GIANT FICUS salicaria '89 and miniature orchid Haraella retrocalla. Is this unlikely New York marriage possible to kick this growing season up a high notch? Will it work o sa pangarap lang? Abangan!

Front: for the grand finale

Back: the epiphyte's alley

Left side: a longer pot is obviously needed to stabilize the center of gravity

Right side: the kneeling giant

Close-up of the nebari

Bridget the midget and her citrus-scented blossom: is she up for the fantasy? 

Strangler Willow

I REPOSITIONED the aerial roots of this willow leaf ficus '89 to reflect its real character: a strangler that strikes terror like a flayed hand, but had to exercise extra caution digging up the roots. I thought I was done with this ficus job this growing season, but this little fellow, a small-leafed non-mutant willow ficus from the Big Island, is arriving next week, not my purchase but a friend's who asked for my training wisdom. I don't know; maybe come back in a year. 

Red Balete And The Aftermath

A NEWCOMER TO THE BACKYARD jungle is this young Ficus concinna or "Red Balete" ($25+$24 shipping+$25 repot). Widely found in Mindoro forests, this fig is characterized by fiery red young leaves that give the tropics an "autumn look" much like the cemetery scene above, then turn leathery dark green as they mature. The brittle specimen in the link was collected by "Prince of Collectors"  Hugh Cuming for the Royal Botanic Gardens between 1835-1839 while on Philippine exploration.  

Andrea's drink-dropper at her nursery for $25

Pruned and repotted three weeks after arrival, reddish new leaves apparent

Aged specimen in Jerry Meislik's house of ficus

BALETE  IS VULNERABLE to cyclonic winds due to its shallow ground roots and heavy crowns, but perfect as a bonsai. How else can it be a grim reminder of typhoon Wanda which leveled Pinamalayan when I was a kid in the 60s long before Nona did in 2015? Remember the F. philippinensis pre-bonsai from a year ago? I recklessly reworked it to play with the idea, and thought it was dead with almost total leaf drop a week after the basal roots were pruned, but after three weeks it looks like it is rebounding with tiny new leaves. It is now the leaning tower of Figsa, but still stable with its trusty aerial roots as suhays.

Pompano Beach resident Jeff McMullan grimaces in the wind as his 80-year-old ficus lies over his home after Hurricane Wilma swept through Florida in 2010. (Robert Duyos, Sun Sentinel)

Unexciting as a pre-bonsai a year ago

Leaf drop about two weeks after restyle and repot, with an angry basal root giving the finger

Draped aerial root removed, tiny new leaves apparent after three weeks: it's alive!

What's Done Is Done

LAST WEEKEND, A MONTH after it arrived, the Ficus philippinensis balete ($150+$28 shipping) had recovered from its transport trauma and was ready to be styled. Repotted and freed in a deep and wide pot (this one was not cheap at $40 with Home Depot free store pick-up, and heavy at 20 pounds in itself) to support unchecked growth and burly trunks, it now looks a bit civilized despite its bandages (inspection tapes from CBP if you can read the label upside down) where incisions were made to graft and reposition a few aerial roots, and the cut water bottles to serve a couple of young guzzlers their fill, all to be removed by the end of summer if the grafts are successful. The trunks are tied together with wires at their point of juncture halfway to the top to see if they will fuse and conjoin, through a process that can take several years called inosculation. As Tatay said after the gapi was accomplished on his kaingin: "There, what's done is done!" The tikbalang, or maybe the mothman, of Mt. Olivet cemetery can't wait to take a spot. To terrorize Maspeth in the meantime, I have this piece from the good book that everyone will like.

Congratulations To Sara

I LIGHT THE FIREWORKS this weekend to congratulate my recent high school graduate who understood, despite the tears, lack of garlands, friend group shots and a processed diploma, that she had to forego a real graduation ceremony in favor of a virtual one during this time of pandemic. She will be attending SUNY Binghamton for a degree in Psychology. Congratulations baby, and thank you to Maspeth Kiwanis for the scholarship award.

Too Close For Comfort

MY INDOOR DENIZENS are foregoing social distancing just to bask in the sun on this backyard beach--er, nursery. It's quite a sight while I do horticulture work and polish repurposing the garage, while The Lettermen croon "A Summer Place" on my wife's radio. Are we really back?

The structure was retired from its original service as a garage, fenced off from the driveway, a private door cut on its side wall, and its window widened to convert it into a writing shed, still in progress under the watchful eye of a fragrant linden tree.

Group shot, clockwise from the rear: (1) the first F. philippinensis (jaundiced from having been indoors since last fall), (2) the latest F. philippinensis with an aerial root being trained soilward using an orange drinking straw, (3) the aged and pricey F. microcarpa with a branch being converted into an aerial root using a water bottle filled with soaked sphagnum moss, (4) the popular F. microcarpa ginseng (also called "mallsai"--go figure), and (5) the young tiger bark F. retusa, in training and experimental restyle. Joining the gang are two other Mindoro denizens in welcome company: (6) sampalok (Tamarindus indica) and (7) kalimumog, tsaang gubat or Fukien tea tree (Ehretia microphylla), both newly repotted.

The young tiger bark F. retusa out of the box.

The trunk was made horizontal by digging up and exposing the main root and propping it on a rock.

Wired and styled with new exposed roots.

Life In The Time Of COVID

TESS HAD TO GO BACK cutting hair when the virus struck and my Chinese barber closed shop in Elmhurst (she now avoids Elmhurst like the plague--ouch!-- including Chinese supermarkets and Pinoy friends she normally visits).  So she gave me this haircut to prove her styling prowess, the one she used on her visiting father (who happened to sport an easy Kojak style) before he passed on. Meanwhile, Andrea Wigert, matriarch of Wigert's Bonsai in Fort Myers, FL sent me this picture of the new Ficus philippinensis pre-bonsai, a diamond-in-the-rough, that I ordered from her before she shipped it from her nursery last Memorial Day weekend.  As soon as it arrived and was by my former garage, Tess volunteered to style it her way, and I must say my new pre-bonsai doesn't look too bad at all. Good job, Mom! Just wait till she gets it repotted and those nebari roots controlled.

Parallel Roots

MY BALETE BONSAI (Ficus microcarpa) has been my keeper of sanity this past week. It is ready to hit the backyard any day soon, but something must to be done first: transform a branch into an aerial root that is parallel with the others and a column of darkly colored soil.

A branch was obstructing the view of the aerial roots.

So I bent it downwards and wired it to an old aerial root.

Removed its foliage and planted it in a pot made from a water bottle filled with black Long Island compost. By the end of summer, new aerial roots will emerge from the branch to be directly planted in and feed on the earth in the ceramic pot. If it doesn't work, I'll use sphagnum moss instead.

Blue (And White) Maspeth, 2015

SINCE THERE WILL BE NO Memorial Day parade in Maspeth this year, I'm going back to this pomp five years ago when NY Dem bigwigs descended on Grand Avenue near Mt. Olivet Cemetery, for a semblance of the normal. From Queens Gazette. Cheers!

Grand Marshals WW II Army veterans 88th Infantryman James Desio and Staff Sergeant William Aronowicz

The NY Shields Police Pipes & Drums

US Senator Chuck Schumer

Queens District Attorney (then Borough President) Melinda Katz

State Senator Joseph Addabbo Jr., former Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley, former Assemblywoman Marge Markey, Attorney General (then Public Advocate) Letitia James and Congresswoman Grace Meng

With Fists Of Turnips Punishes The Land

DEATHS, SUFFERINGS, FEARS--too many to count, all without warning, indiscriminate, not man-made, the result of the natural process of evolution. How do you wrap your head around it?

New Yorkers in the borough of Queens queue at Elmhurst hospital (the center of the city’s coronavirus crisis) for tests as 13 deaths are reported in one day (AP)

A hero: a haunting image out of Elmhurst Hospital in Trump's native Queens that appeared to rattle him. 

A supply shelf in Elmhurst Queens hospital. Dr. Colleen Smith tells ABC News the orange bags are body bags for the deceased.

Workers construct a makeshift morgue outside Manhattan's Bellevue Hospital on Wednesday, March 25, 2020. 

Refrigerator trucks are being used as makeshift morgues in New York. (AP)

A 38-year-old nurse at a Manhattan hospital shared this image yesterday of the inside of one of the refrigerated trucks lined on either side with the dead bodies of covid-19 victims. (Daily Mail)

Nature's handiwork