Le Jardin

Last night at about 1 AM, I was gazing at the ocean- not unusual for me. However, it was such a dreamy night. The moon was so bright that it was casting shadows, even though where I live is pretty well-lit. It was also shining on the ocean, which was something I’ve never seen before. I was mesmerized. If you think back to my post about the sunset, you’ll remember that I try to find exact colors for things- I think it’s so I’ll be sure to remember it when I’m old and far from the memory. So, as I was taking the visual snapshot of the moon on the ocean, I decided it was an ethereal kind of color- definitely not a one-word Crayola color, either. It was gray and green-blue and silver all at the same time, but it moved. The closest tangible thing I could relate it to would be, perhaps, the color of the ripples in a White-out patch after it’s been photocopied. Except slightly greener. Anyway, it was a living color, and it was beautiful.

Then, my eyes wandered to the scene below me. I live on the sixième étage (6th floor), just right of the center of the building, as you look out (ie: looking at the building, my room is slightly to the left). I have a spectacular view of both the mountains and the ocean and the city growing inbetween. I can also see all of the foot traffic that goes in and out of the building. The entrance is actually on the third floor, which holds the front desk, vending machines (where you can get passion fruit flavored soda and hazelnut chocolates), the computer room, and several multi-purpose classrooms. On the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 6th floors are where the students live. But, I digress. On the same level of the first floor is “le jardin” or the courtyard (literally, the garden). I really love to look at it. As I said, I have a good view of the right side of it, as it is divided by the walkway that comes from campus level (the third floor). So, it’s like a sunken courtyard. I hope you can visualize this.

The walkway/parking/hangout area out front connected to the walkway makes a giant “T” with the stem of the T leading to the front doors, and the top of the T making one face of the enormous patio out front. Making sense? Good. So, I want to tell you about what I think about my little view of le jardin.

I find it simply charming. I have no idea who tends to it, who planted it, or really what to think of its existence. On the right side in the corner, next to the door, there are two banana trees (a big bunch of them will be ready in a few more weeks!) and several bushes. They all are shiny and very chlorophyll-y. I imagine that the rich volcanic soil and the endless sunshine make for very happy plants. At least, I’d be happy and well-fed if I were a plant here. A few weeks ago, the banana tree nearest me made a new leaf. At first, it was a long, booger-colored baton, extending from the center of all the other fronds. Then, slowly, it grew longer, and greener, until one morning, after a night of fairly turbulent storming, I saw that it had unfurled and begun to fan itself in the early breeze.

To the right, growing in a crack in le trottoir (sidewalk), is a tangly mess of an impatient plant. Impatients are the little colorful, 5-leaved flowers that my dad used to let me pick up at the Agway when I was 6 or 7 or 8, to plant in my own garden. Imagine seeing the actual plant growing wild in its natural climate, and not in a 6-pack of black plastic. Pleasantly surprising. Its arms are long and have several white blooms at each juncture of stem and leaf. It sort of looks like the land squeezed a pore and out squiggled a flowering plant!

In the middle of the grass, there’s a stump. The tree was cut down a long time ago; the weathered leather-brown color of the middle matches the color of the remaining bark and roots. I wonder what kind of tree it was. Probably coconut- they’re as ubiquitous here as maples and pears are back home. The stump is hatched like the top of an apple pie, or like the back of a piece of clay when you score it to attach to a bigger piece of pottery. The lines are surprisingly exact, and they make me want to trace my fingers through them. Or, stand on it and declare something, like the Lorax would do.

When I first arrived, I used to lean over my railing and watch a Mother Cat and her one Baby live like tigers dans le jardin. The mother is a pale orange, and the baby is gray like a rain cloud. Mother Cat would nap under a shrub, and Baby would creep up in front of her and practice her pouncing skills. Later, Baby would feed, and the two would stalk around like the plants needed patrolling. Naps, playing, feeding, repeat. Now, I hardly see them together, and Baby is nearly the size of Mother Cat. I still want to know how they get in and out. It seems like such an isolated little hide out, but cats are crafty like that.

To finish what I can see from my balcony: just under me there’s a line of bushes with smalls blooms the color of coral. Also, there’s a plant with shiny green and red and yellow stripes. Those abut the sidewalk. Across from them climbing up the wall of the “T” (where the stem of the T and the top of the T meet) are various kinds of vines. Some are alive and some are dead. If I were a snake I’d wind myself up and down in them all day. One can hardly see the faded white fall behind them, and I’m reminded of The Secret Garden or Harry Potter. In front of the wall is the grass patch (with the Apple Pie Stump).

My favorite part of the courtyard is actually what inspired this post. Down in my right corner, there is a rose bush. It’s probably three feet tall and has one main stalk and two smaller ones. It’s interesting, because one of my professors was saying how roses can’t grow here because it’s too hot. Well, the thing about courtyards and roses is that the roses usually don’t just appear there, nor are they abundant enough to make me believe that a seed landed there. So, someone knew that that section of the garden would get just enough light and just enough shade to grow but not scorch the delicate flower. Just four days ago, I spent a good amount of time just staring, partly in disbelief, at the fact that there was a beautiful, perfect bloom on my rosebush. The plant is positioned perfectly so that at night, the light from the stairwell between the ground and first floors is illuminates it. She puts on a show for anyone who has the view and happens to notice. The bloom was a beige-peach color, and I imagined what it smelled like. Like a rose in the US? Probably not, but who will ever know?

On Saturday morning, the flower had dropped all of its petals, and the plant blended back into the green background of le jardin. Who planted that bush, I wonder. The thing about roses is that they are so stereotypically French-romantic (to me, at least), and I stereotypically love them. I am always reminded of the rose character in Le Petit Prince. So, it seemed trite to write about a rose I saw this one time in France, but I couldn’t help myself. If you had seen it bloom, you would have to write too.

I’m not posting a picture, because by now, you all have an image of what it looks like in your mind’s eye, and I don’t want to ruin your imagined jardin. We all need to use our imaginations from time to time. Have fun exploring the courtyard with yours.