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Happy gardener knows the best dirt |
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That's right. That's why our director asked me, a happy gardener, in fact a horticulturist, to fix our front and central courtyards. With such a heavy burden, Dr. Ho has full freedom to lead his troop to grab more NT$ and put more SCI on their CVs. Nowadays, you need more SCIs and longer CVs to let the "big wigs" know who you are and make you a "big wig" too, then, to go out and grab higher positions such as college dean, university president or something. ..... Another reason, I guess, I am too old to learn Arabidopsis and all those tiny wired things.
I am happy to be a horticulturist. That was my undergraduate major, and I am proud of it. One of our former directors teased me now and then saying that horticulture is just a kind of cheap profession, no brain at all, doing nothing but just arranging cut flowers in vases. It is a kind of hobby for woman, he thought. I will write more about this kind of crap next time. ..... Forget about that, let me tell you what I want to do for our central courtyard.
It's hard to say. This is the first time I have to put my thoughts of landscape on paper ... not so easy. First we started to clean it up, clean everything, remove all the ugly junk and debris away. Then we have to plant a lot of selected plants to hide many air-conditioning units and the pipe lines. The best choice is the bird's nest fern (Asplenium spp). They form a large or huge rosette with wide green leaves. We planted many of them, more than 30; all were moved from my home yard, for free. For years, I have tried to keep a good Asplenium collection. They do not need lots of attention, but you do have to be sure that they are shaded. Once exposed to summer sunshine for several days, they will lose chlorophyll and all the mechanisms of photosystem II that some of our colleagues care about and use for making a living.
We removed all the ugly green fence shrub, to let our courtyard merge with neighboring scenery. We should not treat our courtyard as our home backyard. We should not hide from neighbors by using greens, trees and shrubs. Instead, we invite them to enjoy our central courtyard, spacious green lawn, and later (when you all become members of Academia) the big Peepul tree (Ficus religiosa L.) in the middle of our plaza.
From the courtyard, I removed several trees my colleagues had planted years before, those that were not cared for. I owe an apology to them. But I have planted the trees in new location with more sunshine, with easier access to meet people.
Only two sequoia and a stainless tree remain in the green lawn. I dare not touch them. They belong to one of our lady colleagues (of course a Ph.D.). She likes those two sequoia very much, because they were her cell culture babies from test tubes. Our fair lady even planted the stainless tree right in front of one sequoia, describing her whole connection with the magic tree and her alma mater in Chinese on the single stainless leaf. I was told she would plant a new tree with a wider stainless leaf (A3 size) for registering such a holy journey in two languages. I am sure these three trees will be a major scenery spot in our Academia National Park.
Just a sincere suggestion from your poor gardener: sequoia needs more sunshine and cool weather. Taipei summer heat is baking those two sequoia and their 12 cousins on the front greens of the Genomic Center. They have no chance in low land. Being born free, let them transform into giants on cooler highland somewhere in nature.
Two years ago, mass production of SCI stuff made me sick, so alone, I went out and gave my neighborhood alley a flower garden show for the whole year. Here are some snapshots taken at that time. You may understand what kind of landscape style I like. Landscape constructors cannot maintain our yard year round. We have to take care of them every day. Believe me, gardening will make your brain think smart, tame your soul, and make you humble. With your support, let's gardening together; we will have a warm courtyard year round.
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