GROWTH IS GOOD

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Yes growth is doing well, the sun and warmth are certainly helping. What a new experience in growing here in this climate. The pepper plant is already throwing some flower buds, and the basil is doing just fine and already I can get a delicious scent from the seedling, some of which I planted out. Most of all I am happy about the seeds I put down which my friend from Kerala sent me last year, it is the bitter gourd and one of its seeds has sprouted, exciting that is as the last time I tried to grow them in Ireland I only got one gourd, a lovely climbing plant though. The tomatoes and lettuce are growing fast now, soon I will have to stake the tomatoes with the bamboo I found, hope that will work.

Meanwhile I keep picking up stalks which I find in the dusty street while we walk, I root them and already I have collected about eight different succulents, most of them have rooted and some are flowering, it is fun to see this happening, and it costs us nothing. Plants are not cheap here, I am surprised because most of the houses have plants outside their front door and in their front gardens, which are mostly tiled. This makes the street scene quite attractive. You see a lot of succulents here but also cacti of course.
22/10/2016 CONTAINER GARDEN - GOZO

Basil
Bell pepper
Lettuce
Tomato

XAGHRA VILLAGE IS PEACEFUL

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For some days now I’ve been saying that I should visit the village that we can see from our walk on the outskirts of Victoria, high up on the hillside it towers above the countryside. I was intrigued to know more about it. On the map I could see that the village is called Xaghra (pronounced shara with the ‘SH’ of Schindler) Its population is around the 5000! Seeing that the Ġgantija megalithic temples, as well as a stone circle are found there – it must be one of the earliest areas on Gozo of human habitation.

I found the village very peaceful, the little streets picturesque, and the ambience friendly. On this visit I did not go into the temples, nor visited the windmill which, by the way, dates back to 1725. That, as well as the caves with its stalactites and stalagmites, is planned for a visit in the near future. I started off by visiting the church (our Lady of Victories) always curious about what the magnificent Baroque façade will reveal on the inside. It was well worth it too, though too ornamental for my taste. After that I walked for a long time along the narrow streets, just enjoying the limestone houses, some really old and brittle, some quite new. I eventually ended up at a museum of toys where I was shown around all the amazing things of the past, a very interesting place and very nice people to welcome you.

One very interesting building I came across, and will talk about this further down among the photos of it.

I walked for hours (my workout for the day) and took the bus home to Victoria which drove there in 5minutes, I still cannot believe how close together all the places are here.
A wonderful day it was!
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Below are the photos of the building I wanted to talk about.  Though I know nothing about it actually, only what I can see and deduct.  Both the older and the newer building are literary built on rough rock, I just wonder how this is possible, it looked as if the buildings were just plunked loosely on top, but I am sure that cannot be the case.  Also the grey rock seems different material to the regular limestone that is used here as building material.  It’s killing me and I just have to find out more about it.  The last two pictures I took to the side of the older building, there seems something going on with the cement (not sure what type of cement it is)  it gives an interesting and lovely design in the last photo.  I did see this sort of thing also on some of the other buildings in the village.  On my next visit I will go to the town council and try and find out more.  The limestone of the Maltese islands has me totally bewitched.

The lady at the toy museum is a goldmine of information, she showed me so many of the toys, explaining all about them.

OUR IMMEDIATE NEIGHBOURHOOD IN VICTORIA

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It is now two weeks ago that we arrived in Victoria – Ir Rabat, and we are living in a spaceous flat in the shadow of the Citadella – we are not quite in the oldest part of the town with its little, narrow and beautiful streets, but we are close enough to hear, loud and clear, the bells of Santa Marija, the Citadella’s cathedral, this is something I value very much. Both my father and grandfather were bell ringers back in Belgium. The houses in the street here are architecturally interesting, typically built in the Maltese style with its closed balconies, some made of wood like you see in Malta, some made out of stone which you see more on Gozo. I have read that these balconies provided women, who may not have been walking out so often in the past, with the possibility of watching the world go by providing food for talk later on in the day! Personally I find these balconies a very attractive feature. Where we live it is not so quiet, but that does not matter, I want to see life here and experience it. I want to draw it and photograph it, and I want to interact with people, with the Gozitans. A class that I was hoping to attend, in lace making, fell through yesterday, I was disappointed – I even brought my bobbins with which I used to practice making Flemish lace with me. So now I need to try and find other ways to interact and meet the local people. I talk with shopkeepers, librarians, and anybody I meet and seems open to talk – I think that is a start anyway. As with my container garden I need to be patient with this too.
Everyday I take a long walk, not only to buy fresh produce from a vegetable stalls, or to get fish, but also to visit the library, a local museum, or just to get the feel of the town, there is so much to see and take in, I keep discovering new things; buildings, streets, interesting architecture, churches and other aspects of life in Victoria. It sure is interesting. And there is so much to read up on the history of the place, luckily the local library has a good variety of books on the subject.

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AN UPDATE ON MY TERRACE GARDEN

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The tomato plants are doing very well, and so are the lettuce though I think that it is a bit too hot for them, we shall see what comes.
The seedlings are starting to really come up, at the moment they are only as far as the cotyledons but they look healthy and it is exciting to see them grow.
The temperature is still reaching near the 30C but it feels much hotter, it is nice though that now and then there is a little breeze which brings relieve.
I have taken to picking up bits of succulent plants on the roads, this is good because I can propagate them and it is a joy to see them do well. It is fun too to discover yet another orphan lying in the dusty street of Victoria, bringing it home and giving it a new lease of life.  I am really enjoying all this.

My little corner in the conservatory, it will expand as plants will grow.

Every conceivable container is used as we cannot spend to much money on buying plant pots, and anyway its good to re-cycle isn’t it.

These are all succulents that I found on the street and brought home.

Some of my seedlings coming up, some more containers that are going to be put to use.

Here are two more succulents and their flowers, pretty and interesting.

 

IR-RABAT (Victoria)

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I would just like to share some of the beauty of this lovely town where I am living at this moment. There is so much to explore, everyday brings something else interesting. Like in the old part, the picturesque narrow streets leading to St George’s Square and cathedral. There is a museum there that is very worthwhile of a visit. I will be spending more time there. So much to learn about the history of this place, the people and their traditions. Luckily we will be here long enough to explore.

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Gozo Gossiping, a sculpture by Joe Xuereb in Globigerina Limestone

A SMALL CONTAINER GARDEN ON GOZO

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About a week ago we arrived on the island of Gozo, we are staying in the wonderful town of Victoria and have a flat there that has a terrace and a small conservatory too. As I miss my garden in West Cork I decided to try my hand here at growing plants, herbs, small vegetables and also flowers in containers and yesterday I started. I will use anything I can get my hands on as containers, milk cartons, bottle bottoms, buckets etc. but I also bought some long containers in a garden centre, soil also and it was a job getting that up the stairs but I managed. I had brought some sealed seeds from home and sowed some of the herbs including a really good small leafed basil, and lemon balm. Here in Victoria I bought four tomato plants and some lettuce plants to start myself off. To prepare the soil I used coffee grinds, banana peels and eggshells and I added a bit of this underneath each plant. The temperature here is still around 30C and humidity is high, though the last few days it has become less so. Sunshine a plenty here!
I had sown some chives earlier in the week and goodness me one little seedling has popped up today! I am waiting and hoping for more.
My aim is to grow everything organic but for a start my soil is not, one must do what one can of course and it is not possible to get organic soil around here, at least I will not be using pesticides or fertilizer and that has got to be good. The magic of seeing things grow is already good enough for me and the enjoyment that gives is very good for one’s health anyway – so!
I found some bamboo sticks on the side of the road and took them home to use as supports when the tomato plants get bigger. I also found a lovely piece of succulent plant on the footpath the other day which I have now rooted and it produced a beautiful little orange flower. There were the cacti to look after that belong to the flat, and I am rooting another few succulent leaves that I found on the road.

I am so very happy here on Gozo, I just love everything about the place, the people, the architecture, the limestone, the culture, the exotic plants, the weather, the sun, and the Mediterranean foods, it is all wonderful!

Making my fertilizer from banana skins, coffee grinds, and eggshells.

Containers ready to use, some of them anyway.  Seeds picked to sow.

bought lettuce plant
tomato

Tomato and lettuce plants

bamboo sticks found on roadside
start of container garden

The bamboo sticks to support the tomato plants when the time comes

microgreens broccoli sprouting
testing seeds: wintercrop lettuce 6/10

Some micro plants, and trying out lettuce seeds from back home

The cacti belonging to the flat after I gave them some TLC, and the succulent i found on the footpath the other day, all are doing fine.

SHADES OF AUTUMN

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The colours of the autumn season, in all their different browns have all got beautiful and inspiring names I think, as inspiring as their shades  differ in hues and in the energy they emanate. I guess we associate browns very much with the mellow and misty autumn season, the shades of amber, ochre, sepia, chestnut, burnt sienna, russet, bronze, copper, and tawny to name only a few can usually be found in a variety of autumn leaves, a beautiful pallet.  Many painters have used browns to good advantage, among them Caravaggio of whom I recently admired two original works in the cathedral in Valetta. He very effectively used browns to create his wonderful shadows.  Anton Van Dyke used browns also, he used a brown called Cassel Earth, it was made up mainly of decayed vegetable matter. Iron oxide though is the most common ingredient in brown pigments, but also manganese oxide.

I read a fascinating book last year about colours, about the origins, their historical uses and much more. The book is called “Colours: Travels through the paintbox” and is written by Finli Viktoriya. It sure takes one travelling, and also back into history, a great read.
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RAPSODY IN BLUE

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These are some of the images of my life in the past year, and I chose the colour blue because that seems to have figured a lot in my life the last twelve months. While choosing the photos out of my media library here at my WordPress.com I enjoyed wonderful memories of both beauty and joy, and would like to share this with all my friends.

Iris unguicularis
Glimpse of moon today

DANCE OF THE SPIDERS

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Yesterday I took a look at some of the spiders which were hanging around the garden, seeing that the turn of the season is almost upon us and with the morning mists and the evening becoming cooler, the spiders seem to become much more noticeable. They immediately reminded me of ballerinas, especially the three first ones that I came across, they are garden spiders, Araneus diadematus, also called the Crowned Orb Weaver. You see those a lot around here, they are quite beautiful and have sometimes huge webs.  They rarely enter the house.  In autumn the gardens are full of them.  I took the first three photos, of two different spiders just outside along the wall beside the rainwater barrel.

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The fine slender spider is quite unfamiliar to me and I cannot locate it, I did not see it before in the garden either.

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Here in between two leaves (the leaves looked as if they had been pulled together into some sort of hammock), there are two garden spiders, sleeping perhaps, not sure but they looked quite cosy in there. I’ll be keeping an eye out for other species with the autumn starting. We are still getting nice weather, perhaps we might even get an Indian summer. Schools have started and everyone is getting back into routine, we saw a great number of swallows gathering on a neighbour’s roof, another sign of the season’s changing and their farewell to our shores, and we ourselves are preparing for our journey to warmer climate too.