Canal Town Gardening

In which I prepare my "garden" for spring, and enjoy some Women's Day vegetables

In my 11th-floor apartment, I am blessed with approximately six square metres of outdoor space, in the shape of my balcony. This is primarily designed as a laundry area — the washing machine is installed in one corner, next to a sink and small cupboard for storing supplies. Up above, there’s a handy double-barrelled pulley system to hang the wet clothes; this works great on sunny days, not so well in wet winter winter when laundry can take days to dry. But soon after I moved in to this apartment, during the dark days of Covid, I decided that the balcony was going to double up as my garden. I invested in plant pots and stands, and a wooden folding chair so that I can sit in the sun and enjoy it on those days that are not too hot or too cold or too smoggy.

The result, while it’s not going to win any prizes at the Chelsea Flower Show, has been a source of joy. The rose in a pot, given as a housewarming gift, has produced copious fire-red blossoms year after year. The mint survived the really hot summer where I came back from holiday to find it looking like it had gone through a fire, and still provides its leaves to refresh drinks and salads. The baby radishes that I grew over the winter were delicious in pasta dishes and as pickles. Perhaps best of all are those Sunday afternoons when I have no engagements and I can sit among the plants with my coffee and my book, listening to the chattering of the mynas (they’ve learned to imitate the sound of car alarms, among other things) and to the rumble of traffic below.

A Canal Town sunset from my 11th-floor urban micro-garden.

Last weekend, the weather suddenly turned warm and sunny, giving me the impetus I needed to tidy up and replant for the spring. I cleared the junk that had built up. I have a habit of storing the non-recyclable polystyrene boxes that my cheese and other perishable foodstuffs get delivered in when I buy them on Taobao, and using them as planting containers. There’s a limit to how many I can actually use though, so I reluctantly binned the older and more broken ones. I said goodbye to the potted azalea that died over the summer. And then I planted new seeds. More radishes, because they grew fast and well. Chillies, which I’ve never yet been successful with. Chinese chives, just to see. Petunias, because someone had given me some seed, and why not? It’s all looking rather bare at the moment, but hopefully in a few weeks the planters will be full of fresh shoots and I’ll be able to harvest some before I go.

I’m not the only one doing some springtime gardening. A couple of weeks ago (8th March) was Women’s Day. This is something I never marked before coming to China, but it is an official holiday here. Women are legally allowed half the day off work, and many workplaces will have activities that female employees can choose to participate in. Last year the campus organised a half-day outing to a historic small town on the Grand Canal. A lot of people complained about that one because we spent more time on the coach than in the place we were visiting. So this year, the campus arranged an opportunity to dress up in traditional costume and have your photo taken by a professional photographer, and an opportunity to make your own hairclips by sticking beads and ribbons and things onto a base.

I’m not really a craft-your-own-hairclip kind of person, and I was teaching during the dressing-up time. But I did get a big bag of vegetables. I was leaving the cafeteria after lunch, when some of the campus service staff waved me over to where they stood by a stack of crates of pak choi.

“Laoshi!” they shouted. “Teacher, come and get your gift!”

They presented me with a couple of kilograms of the young greens in a cellophane bag, and asked if they could take a photo. One of the farmers / gardening staff who had presumably helped grow the vegetables posed with me, while I held the bag of pak choi in front of me like a shield. I’m still only about halfway through eating it.

Interesting gifts from employers are one of the fun features of life here. In my previous workplace in Beijing, one Women’s Day we got a DIY cupping kit, for the traditional Chinese medical therapy of applying vacuum suction to pressure points on your body. I never figured out how to use that one properly. Perhaps my favourite, for sheer entertainment value and utter down-to-earth practicality, was when I jogged my way round the annual campus run, and received the prize of a 12-pack of toilet roll.

The pak choi was fresh and tasty though. I think it was grown on campus. In one corner, near the clinic and the rubbish disposal area, there’s a series of vegetable plots. Last semester, this was the site of the student vegetable-growing competition. One group of freshmen invited me to join their team as their “advisor.” We could choose to grow radishes or spinach, and after some discussion of which would be less work, they chose radishes. On the launch day, back in October, we all gathered to sow the seeds, “under the guidance of the local farmers.” The local farmers demonstrated how to hoe the cracked grey soil of the plots and what depth to place the seeds, and then the students had at it.

Our radish-growing team waters the dry soil after sowing the seed.

It’s just as well I was there, because none of the young men on my team had any clue about gardening, though they were very sweet and tried hard. One lad phoned his grandfather for advice. We eventually got the seeds planted and watered, and then they had the responsibility of watering and weeding them as the weeks went on. I did a little myself sometimes, wandering over on a lunchtime to see how the seedlings were growing. I’m amazed they grew as well as they did, and half suspect that the campus gardeners might have helped water them when the students were negligent. It was fun, though, and I think good for these urban kids to get their hands dirty and see how hard it is and how rewarding it is to grow things. Eventually, the radishes were harvested and I believe our team “won”, much as I roll my eyes at the desire to turn everything into some kind of competition.

It’s a little sad, this year, to plant seeds and not know whether they’ll be ready to harvest before I leave Canal Town. But I’m sure my green-fingered Chinese colleague (whose office looks more like a greenhouse than a workplace) and other friends can take them and enjoy them after I’ve gone.

Meantime, it’s springtime. The willow trees are budding like brilliant green chandeliers, the plum blossoms are a haze of pink beside the campus lake, the white and pink magnolias are like flocks of fat birds on the bare branches, and the cherry blossom is still to come.

New to Canal Town? Start here for an introduction!

Miss my last post? Catch up below!