Seasons Greetings!

To wish you all, a Peaceful and blessed Christmas time with family and friends...

The merriment of the season and year end is here, with the familiar tunes of ol' carols still ringing in my ears... yet I ponder where the days have flown and what little I managed to achieve or done to fill up the last 12 months.

Now, as we hover over week 52 of the year with my rush to complete missed and outstanding chores, can't help but noticed how quickly the last quarter had elapsed or was it just my funny feeling with age catching up?  Honestly, the earth must be spinning that wee bit faster with each passing year, as is, with all things gaining momentum!

wreath of baubles

English village scene @ 1 Utama,,PJ

Toyland @ Mid Valley

Santa @ Empire, Subang Jaya

poinsettias galore

As we forlornly tear away the last page of the calendar or have it scrapped for good, as a creature of habit, we always line up a bright new one to usher in the new year...

The Scenic KLCC Park #2

Discovering this beautifully designed park has been absolute eye opener for me and to think it had been around all these ages makes it more regrettable that I'd not ventured there earlier... such artful encapsulation of design and nature - just stupendous!

Besides the magnificent green hues, at selected rest areas one can find complementary colours from the flowering trees and leaves.  Here's some from nature's palette...

top left - plumeria; top right - albizia guachapele (chime tree);
bottom left - plumeria; bottom right - ixora

ficus elastica

ochroma pyramidale (balsawood)

left - saraca thaipingensis ;
 right - erythrina fusca (coral bean)

left - ixora; right - plumeria

Locally, the various visually striking plumerias are known as 'frangipanis' which exude the most unforgettable  fragrance only at night to lure the moths for pollination...

The official opening hours at the KLCC Park are 7am - 10pm daily (last admission 1hr 30mins before close).

The Gebang Palm

Botanical Name : Corypha utan/Corypha elata
a.k.a. Gebang (Malay)/Buri

The "bronzy-leaved" palms are such a cheerful contrast to the park greens with steel masses in the background.  Actually, there were two groups of the Gebang palms in the KLCC park. These being so eye-catching, one could not miss....

One batch were planted beside the C. umbraculifera and some larger, shadier trees. They seemed okay but less happy.

This batch on the undulating ground beside the man-made stream and an adjacent pedestrian bridge looks absolutely vibrant and "sun tanned" in the the open.  Just stunning!

sunny & toasted

These palms are found in India, throughout South-east Asia and even at the tip of Northern Australia. Their habitat are mainly along river courses, flood plains and grassy land.  These large and tall palms do grow to heights of about 20m.  Like the C. umbraculifera, they also flower towards the end of their lifetime with a massive display of a long inflorescence with countless flowers.

shady spot

large palmate leaves

The woody trunk is capped with many petiole ends, all armed with spines! 

The Talipot Palm

Botanical Name : Corypha umbraculifera

One of the ginormous palms sighted todate!  Everything about this young palm is humongous so the picture here may not indicate its true proportion but standing beside it, I felt like a David & Goliath.

A native of Southern India and Sri Lanka, it is widely cultivated throughout South-east Asia where its leaves are used for thatching and palm sap fermented into a wine.

Its impressive statistics would be somewhat a Guinness record of the flora kind. Some of its awesome and dramatic characteristics are - it can reach heights of 25m; it's monocarpic i.e. flowering only once in its lifetime between 30-80yrs; the largest unbranched inflorescence with uncountable (a million?) miniscule flowers; the fruits take about a year to mature and a sad quirk of nature - the palm dies after fruiting.

The long robust petioles can reach lengths up to 4m, looks clean and without spines while the large palmate leaves stretch out wide about 3-4m in diameter.

playing host to epiphytic ferns

Impressive but definitely not one for the small home garden!