Jackfruit at the pool
May seems to be the season for large tree-borne fruits to ripen. The university is built on land that was once a durian orchard, so in a few parts of campus you can see very large spiky durians hanging perilously high. Old inhabitants of the neighborhood will start to congregate underneath these trees in early June, waiting for the fruit to fall. It is not recorded how many people have been injured by falling durians, but you do need a machete to open one up.
Here in the university’s pool complex there are mostly coconut and jackfruit trees. The coconut trees have orchids bound to their trunks, and are most beautiful. The jackfruit I didn’t even notice until one day last week, when I happened to have my camera with me. As you can see, these are getting ready to harvest. I think the pool people will get them – they probably planted them in the first place, and since they maintain and guard the pool from 7 a.m. until 8 or 9 p.m., they certainly deserve whatever they cultivate.
I have yet to try either raw jackfruit or durian. Clearly my time in the tropics is wasted, despite my enthusiasm for rambutans and mangosteens.