24 February, 2014

A farming experiment!

Thampy, our domestic helper for thirty years brought this bunch of bananas to our door step two days back. This was one of the first bunches from the garden. Thampy himself had planted the banana plants and tendered them over the last nine months. We were delighted to see the ripe banana and felt thrilled at the prospect of further success in farming. 

However farming is a demanding exercise. The banana plants need attention fairly regularly as they are vulnerable to pests, storm, and stem disease. 

Both Anna and I are novices and follow the advice of our domestic helpers in planning for planting and crop rotation.  

One of the things we are learning first hand is that, plants grow and bear fruit because they are cared for. When Anna plucked a few months back the beans from the kitchen garden, she felt glad in having had the privilege of planting and harvesting. Not all of us get this privilege of working with our hands and turning the soil to plant and take the produce. 

But all of us have the opportunity to sow some acts of kindness on others, wherever we are. When the watchmen offered to carry my bag when he saw mew struggling, I realised that he was giving away something good to bear fruit later. When, some of the students returned to thank us for the get-together we organised for them, they were sowing some seeds of kindness and gratefulness. It is not because  we are likely to reap what we sow, we ought to be doing any good, but to be messengers of goodness in word and deed, like Jesus of Nazareth, who 'went about doing Good’.

.M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

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