Half For You And Half For Me
It is the annual plant swap of Mid Atlantic Gardening again! We gather every year at the lovely home of Garden Grandma and Grandpa to swap plants and have a potluck lunch together. Some people arrange for exchanges before hand. Some just show up with or without plants to see if they get lucky. And there are some generous people who, year after year, just bring vegetable seedlings and their garden extras to give away without asking for anything back. Many times, the old timers would just dig something up for each other simply because they think the recipient would like this plant. It is a pure gift of love.
MAG is an informal group -- no dues, no address, no website; just a simple forum page sponsored by Houzz.com. It is so informal that, basically, if you show up, you are one of us. People volunteer their time and effort to make these events happen. There have been people who come in order to suck up free stuff. It does not take long for them to be weeded out. Although there are no official rules or regulations, the general practice is to be nice, fair and considerate. The whole point for the swap is to make each other happy by sharing plants we have to spare. Being greedy or petty is totally against the philosophy of this community. I have met few people who are willing to share with others so generously like this group of gardeners.
The only case I can think of would be my Japanese classmate, Kazuko, who I met when I was in France. She quit her job and poured all her savings into getting a French MBA. I was a poor student from Hong Kong who was relying totally on a scholarship from the French government. Both of us lived our days counting the change in our pockets.
We became instant good friends and we watched out for each other. In the many occasions when the school cafeteria closed unannounced, we scraped together whatever we had so we both got to eat. How I miss the days of squatting on the floor to cook with a tiny pan on an electrical hot plate! We lived like homeless people in our dorm rooms.
One time, Kazuko showed me a tiny little plastic box with joyful tears. It was two beautiful Japanese sour plums. Someone went home and brought this back as a gift. Little things like this are really precious and significant when you are thousands of miles away from home.
At dinner in my dorm room that evening, she offered me a delicious sour plum. "Are you sure?" I asked her. She nodded her head with tremendous determination. I still can't believe she did it. It was such a noble act of friendship. I remember sucking on the salty plum stone all evening.
This makes me think of a similar story a Holocaust survivor recounted in a video at the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C. This old lady was a teenager in a concentration camp. She befriended another young woman about her age. These girls were such good friends that they were not separable.
Food was hard to come by in the camp. Occasionally, one of them would receive something, like a piece of bread or a bowl of gruel. They would always split it evenly and shared it with each other. The lady recounted that they would draw a line in the gruel to divide it into two halves and then eat only their own half -- no more, no less -- before giving it to the other.
To those who have never been hungry, or to live without, my story sounds so silly. A sour plum! And you even write a blog post about it!!
If you cannot appreciate the sentiment I am trying to share, you must have been quite lucky and privileged all your life. Good for you.
MAG is an informal group -- no dues, no address, no website; just a simple forum page sponsored by Houzz.com. It is so informal that, basically, if you show up, you are one of us. People volunteer their time and effort to make these events happen. There have been people who come in order to suck up free stuff. It does not take long for them to be weeded out. Although there are no official rules or regulations, the general practice is to be nice, fair and considerate. The whole point for the swap is to make each other happy by sharing plants we have to spare. Being greedy or petty is totally against the philosophy of this community. I have met few people who are willing to share with others so generously like this group of gardeners.
The only case I can think of would be my Japanese classmate, Kazuko, who I met when I was in France. She quit her job and poured all her savings into getting a French MBA. I was a poor student from Hong Kong who was relying totally on a scholarship from the French government. Both of us lived our days counting the change in our pockets.
We became instant good friends and we watched out for each other. In the many occasions when the school cafeteria closed unannounced, we scraped together whatever we had so we both got to eat. How I miss the days of squatting on the floor to cook with a tiny pan on an electrical hot plate! We lived like homeless people in our dorm rooms.
One time, Kazuko showed me a tiny little plastic box with joyful tears. It was two beautiful Japanese sour plums. Someone went home and brought this back as a gift. Little things like this are really precious and significant when you are thousands of miles away from home.
At dinner in my dorm room that evening, she offered me a delicious sour plum. "Are you sure?" I asked her. She nodded her head with tremendous determination. I still can't believe she did it. It was such a noble act of friendship. I remember sucking on the salty plum stone all evening.
This makes me think of a similar story a Holocaust survivor recounted in a video at the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C. This old lady was a teenager in a concentration camp. She befriended another young woman about her age. These girls were such good friends that they were not separable.
Food was hard to come by in the camp. Occasionally, one of them would receive something, like a piece of bread or a bowl of gruel. They would always split it evenly and shared it with each other. The lady recounted that they would draw a line in the gruel to divide it into two halves and then eat only their own half -- no more, no less -- before giving it to the other.
To those who have never been hungry, or to live without, my story sounds so silly. A sour plum! And you even write a blog post about it!!
If you cannot appreciate the sentiment I am trying to share, you must have been quite lucky and privileged all your life. Good for you.
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