One of the reasons why I enjoy spending time at my in-laws’ place is their small garden. When I say small, I really mean it. I think it’s not bigger than 5x5 meters which is tiny comparing to large gardens that we have back home in Slovakia. It might be tiny, but it is so charming!
My father-in-law loves gardening. He will become 80 years old in January next year, but it doesn’t stop him from gardening. I believe that this is what keeps him young.
Every time we visit them, he greets us and hurries us to see his new additions to the garden. He focuses on flowers and small decorative bushes as growing vegetables requires more work and as he keeps saying: his back isn’t as young as it used to be. He tries to grow as many plants as possible, and there are so many already that it is difficult to move between them.
His biggest pride is his old fig tree. When I saw it for the first time 10 years ago, I couldn’t believe my eyes. I didn’t know that you could grow figs in The Netherlands! I think that the tree is approximately as old as my husband and keeps giving us sweet fruit every year. He loves the tree and takes great care of it. Holland was facing heat waves in the last couple of weeks and he was so worried about the tree that he kept watering it every day.
My mother-in-law wasn’t that excited about it and complained to us, in the hope that we would talk to him. It is funny how they put us in between and expect us to resolve their issues. I think this is what 40+ years marriage does to some people.
When we saw the sad puppy look on his face while he was collecting fallen dry yellow leaves, we couldn’t tell him anything and let him water the tree again.
He even found a place for an apple tree!
Another plant that cannot be missed in his garden is the chili pepper, or Lombok as they call it in Indonesia. He eats chili peppers every day and can’t grow them fast enough to fulfill his own eating demand – first world problems. Of course, his chili peppers are the best in the world!
A new addition to his few vegetables is white and purple eggplant. They are still very small and cute. He didn’t have space for them, so he placed them on a bench that was supposed to be used for sitting – great solution as there is now no space for sitting. He was disappointed to hear that we will probably not come back in the autumn as he wanted us to try them. He has already planned the meals that he wanted to prepare for us.
It was difficult to take photos of his flowers as he kept touching them and telling me why he grows them. He is not that much into technology and it took me ages to explain to him that he should not come so close to the camera because his finger will be in the photo as well.
There is a lot of talk in the media about the fact that every year there are less and less bees, and my mother-in-law always likes to do her own thing to make the world a better place to be, so this year she bought an insect house. She has been disappointed because she expected that it will be full of insects much faster. She moved it around the garden until she found the spot that she believes is perfect for it. Every morning she goes out and looks for the bees happily buzzing around. I hope for her that they will find it soon.
It was so nice to see them after almost 6 months. They were excited to have us around and we were feeling like in an all inclusive 5 stars hotel. I hope to come back soon and eat some Lombok for lunch again.
Thank you for reading!
Cheers!
Martina
