 |
 Cardamom
garden My driver (a white Ambassador--what else?) and de facto guide
spied the cardamom garden on our way back to Munnar. We were tired and
hungry from our long trip up to the tea gardens, and the rain clouds were
quickly making their way toward us. But what was a little monsoon rain
when we could smell cardamom in the air? I knocked on the door of the
drying hut and was happy to find Bosewell Ninan, the manager of the garden
who graciously shared the details of his work. He tended nearly 2,000
plants, all grown on an impossibly steep strip of land wedged in a hairpin
turn of the mountain road. He told us about the growing, grading,
harvesting, drying and selling of cardamom, a spice that originated here
in the cool forests of the Western Ghats. From the amount of water each of
his plants required to that year's price on the market, he patiently
explained the business of "green gold." Cardamom plants curve
high overhead, but their fragrant seed pods grow on spiky stems near the
ground.
next
|
