On most days, we eat vegetarian. We have fish once a week at the most, chicken once or twice a month, and beef or other meat on very rare occasions. The few times we do eat meat or poultry, I am ready to dig into my pockets for prime quality, raised organically and locally, because food that is shipped hundreds or thousands of miles across the country is not sustainable even if it is organic. Continue reading
It was the most intense basil scent I had ever smelled. 27,000 basil plants, as far as the eye can see… well not quite, as outside the greenhouse the early 20th-century factory buildings stood tall nearby, which made the sea of basil all the more surreal. Continue reading
Since the election, I had been in a black hole like so many of my friends and family. I tried to look at it as a gardener: Sometimes I dig up an entire area in my garden, I rip out everything to replant it. It is messy and unsightly in the beginning, and it takes muscle power, sweat, patience, perseverance, and quite a few blisters and calluses on my hands to turn it into a pretty flower bed or into a productive vegetable plot. Continue reading
“Green Card Gardener” is my story, a work in progress about how I came to America on a Diversity Visa that I won in the Green Card Lottery, how I became a passionate gardener on a remote rural hilltop in Pennsylvania, and how with every gardening season I feel more at home in America. Yet, there is not a day I forget where I come from, a family of diverse identities, traditions and heritage.
By renaming this blog “Green Card Gardener” I speak as an immigrant to this country. Continue reading
Green Card Gardener 