A garden plot sponsored by the Garland Multicultural Commission is coming soon to the Garland Community Garden.

A garden is a library with so many volumes that one person cannot possibly open them all in one lifetime.  I was reminded of this truth today when I met with Kaushalya Siriwardana and Nancy Seaberg.  (Nancy is a member of Loving Garland Green and the newsletter editor for The Heritage Herb Club. She is also the official Loving Garland Green project leader for our multicultural garden project.)  

Kausha and Nancy holding some Sun Gold tomatoes from the garden today

The purpose of our meeting today was to make further plans regarding the establishment of a multicultural garden plot at the Garland Community Garden.  To date, Loving Garland Green members have created the basic layers of a lasagna bed--four feet wide and twenty feet long.  The only things missing are the top layer of garden soil and the plants. We hope to obtain plants from immigrants from other countries who live in Garland.  These would be plants that perhaps they brought with them from their country of origin--plants that most of us native Texans never heard of, yet grow well in our climate.

So, if you have a neighbor, or if perhaps you are one of the thousands of immigrants in Garland who has a plant from your garden to share, please call me at 972-571-4497 and I'll pass your contact information on to Nancy and Kausha.

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And a funny thing happened on the way to the garden:  We figured out what our first plant donation for the multicultural garden would be!

Sometimes we are so close to our faces that we cannot see our noses. As we were brainstorming about the various community cultural centers and places for obtaining these plants, I asked Kausha if she grew any plants unusual to Texans in her garden.  The answer was yes.  Kausha grows gotu kola (Centella Asiatica).  It is also known as the Asiatic pennywort or Indian pennywort in English, among various other names in other languages.  is a small, annual herb. It is used as a leafy green in Sri Lankan cuisine. A traditional accompaniment to rice and curry, it goes especially well with vegetarian dishes, such as dhai and pumpkin curry. Gotu Kola is considered quite nutritious.  Thus we selected the first plant to be included in the Garland Multicultural Commission's Garden.  Kausha has also promised a few Gotu Kola recipes.

From each contributor, in addition to the plant, we hope to obtain a few recipes that we can share on the Loving Garland Green website along with some of their memories of gardens and gardeners.  I know that Kausha's mother was an avid gardener so I'm hoping we can get a story from her about her mother's garden.  We are considering the possibility of perhaps creating a series of these stories--perhaps for Channel 13.

NOTE: It has been called to my attention the Garland Multicultural Commission has not yet voted on whether they will sponsor this garden plot, thus their sponsorship of this plot is not official just yet.   My error.  I understood that sponsorship had been approved.