From: tychen at ippfwhr.org on 1997.07.31 at 16:02:06(1007)
dear aroiders,
i have just returned from a wonderful trip to java, where i
participated in a gamelan festival. unfortunately, i don't have muc=
h
to report botanically speaking, the highlights of this trip were more
cultural, although i did some hiking and visited bogor.
in yogyakarta where the festival took place, highlights included
playing at the festival for an enthusiastic audience, then having the
sultan of yogyakarta invite a group of us, foreigners (american,
european and japanese), to play at the palace for a command
performance, which we did decked out in full royal retainer costumes.=
the sultan himself did not show up, so we played for tourists and the
royal musicians (i think we were more of a freak show, foreigners
trying to play their music...). afterwards, the royal musicia=
ns took
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over for a dance concert.
while in central java, we also attended all-night puppetry shows,
visited borobudur, many other temples, solo (central java's other
royal city, where we attended many dance and music performances) and
hiked in kaliurang, which is a mountain resort. the only aroids i s=
aw
were cultivated taro. it is quite a site to see pine trees, banana,=
bamboo, tree ferns and taro all within the same hills.
i also visited bogor, cibodas and jakarta, where unfortunately i got
very sick from drinking milk (somehow i became lactose intolerant
after a few weeks there). at bogor botanical gardens, i saw the
infamous amorphophallus titanum (araceae) in bloom! i have a picture
of it, although the spathe is not totally unfurled, the spadix must
have been close to 6 foot tall, and there were a few others leafing in=
the background. no smell yet, when i was there. speaking of
infamous, i also tasted durian fruit while in yogyajarta.
in addition to the titan arum and taro, i noticed some other aroids in=
people's gardens in yogyakarta, they seem to grow a lot of
silver-veined anthurium (crystallinum, clarinervium and others),
aglaonema costatum, in addition to orchids and ferns.
i didn't bring back any plants but have seeds of mangosteen, jambu
(syzigium), caesalpinia pulcherrima, bauhinia, white calliandra and
another yellow leguminosa. if anyone is interested in them, please
contact me privately.
now that i'm back, i was wondering how the list has been. i have al=
so
lost a few plants while i was away, so if anyone has spare plants and
would like to trade, please contact me privately.
tsuh yang chen, new york city
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