Mowing is more fun if you learn to identify the turf grasses:
From the Secoya nation in the Amazon I learned that if you get bit by a snake, you will have to talk to the Boss of Snakes and thereafter track down the clan, family, and individual snake responsible for the bite. This way the matter can be resolved, and the wound healed in an amicable manner.
Amongst the Zulu Swazi and Shangaan peoples of South Africa, traditional healers called sangomas undergo training to correspond with their ancestors, and ask them for assistance in times of need. This training is sometimes precipitated by a period of illness whereby the apprentice is physically or metaphorically submerged in a river, and encounters the Master of the Water Snakes. Thereafter, knowledge is transmitted to the healer-to-be in a fluid and flowing fashion.
On a trip to New Orleans, I was waiting at the dock to go on an airboat tour of the swamp cypress canals and bayou. I wanted to say hi to the alligators and snapping turtles. Bored of just sitting there, I wandered off to go and explore the dense undergrowth and forest nearby. Did not get very far before a hectic man yelled, “Get the hell out of there! You are going to get bit by a water moccasin!”. And so that was the end of beating around the bush…
Well on the island of Taiwan aka Formosa, before the coming of the Portuguese, Dutch, Japanese and Chinese peoples, there lived and continue to live a number of indigenous aboriginal southeast asian malay polynesian tribal peoples. In one of their stories, a Bunun tribe woman named Hossu married a man named Li Ta Ko from the Rukai tribe. They were happy for a while, but things did not work out. Basically it came down to this: she liked to eat snakes – specifically, Chinese moccasins – and the in laws did not. Hossu left the Rukai, and ended up alone in the misty mountains. She kept waiting for a husband who did not come for her. In sadness, anger, and bitterness, she etched the rocks with her fingertip, and kept eating snake meat. And when she spat out the bones, they would turn into more snakes! The land was filled with pit vipers. This rock where she sat and traversed is called the great carved rock of Oponohu, and it is in the Maolin district of Kaohsiung County, in the southwestern mountains of the island.
Guess that is what I try to do too when I am angry or frustrated, channel that destructive energy into something a little bit positive and productive like art. Here she is, my Queen of the Hundred Paces.
Started this painting on the day of the three kings January 6th
guess its my take on the Epiphany, Amazonian style
If you want to learn more about what is going on down south of the border in the jungles-
here is the crew: https://amazonfrontlines.org/
hoping that instead of gold, frankincense and myrrh,
they bring gifts of jaguars, anacondas, and a nice clean river of many colors
A lot of the indoor house plants are in the arum family
they are grown for their fanciful foliage and occasionally for their neat colorful flowers, if you can call em that
it is a cool lookin group with an atypical inflorescence
the inflorescence is composed of a big hoody like spathe of a backdrop
coupled with a stick of flowers within called a spadix
this matures into either a stick full of fleshy berries or a stick of hard dried bladder looking fruits
If you like to eat poi and taro and enjoy luaus at Hawaiian vacations
or got a room full of odd vining plants crawling all over the walls and ceiling
you already know this family well enough
theres also a bunch of outdoor arum members,
some common and weedy, others very desirable in a carrion sort a way
Heres a few pages of super simplified descriptions at the genera level as an introduction
good luck and have fun learning em all as you travel the nurseries and tropics
Mission Azul 