Flower Power

This is the time of year on La Palma when wild flowers are popping up everywhere in all colours.  April is when the action starts to get going (if you don't count the months building up to it) and nature is still on a roller-coaster of colour as we zoom into May.
Whilst each year is a little bit different with certain flowers being more prominent, a good old faithful is one that never ceases to amaze me although I guess it is not strictly wild. I see that I wrote about it last year as well - little wonder with its perfect little parasols of shocking purple!

 

Another plant that I really appreciate grows steadily throughout the year, slowly and silently spreading itself across the ground or down a wall, all along hoping you won't notice. It's a succelent plant which means that basically it doesn't care if it gets water or not.  This is my type of plant.   It then produces wonderful pale lemon flowers seemingly from nowhere and then of course it's too late to cut it back because you can't bear to cut the flowers off. 

Then there is a variation of the sweet pea.  My previous experience of growing them in the UK was that it took plenty of patience to first get them growing and then make sure they followed the appointed path up bamboo canes.  From there, with luck, they would make a colourful show.
Here on La Palma, they grow like plants posssessed!  Great tumbling and billowing clouds of them line the donkey path at the side of the finca but - to be honest - they don't do much harm there.  However, they are not content with that but want to envelop anything else they can find such as our lovely white wild rose which is in full bud at the end of the path. 

But my final salute is to the wild poppy.  It strikes me as being such a brave little flower with its 'hey, here I am' bright red colour.  And yet, when you come to inspect it more closely, it is in fact the most delicate of flowers with not a robust petal to its name.  For sheer simplicity, to me, it's a winner. And that's my reason for letting it grow (almost) wherever it likes on the finca here in Franceses.

A Day to Remember

If you live on La Palma, one thing you might want to arm yourself with - apart from sun cream - is a calendar of public holidays and fiestas.   With this useful aid, you will have some idea when the shops are likely to be closed, apart from weekends and siesta time.  Although, I have to admit, no list is definitive as you might find what I call 'flying fiestas' (local ones) which are not on any list or calendar.  

Whilst many of them are obvious, such as  Christmas Day, New Year's Day and Easter, some are less so although the 1st and 30th of May (pleasingly called 'Day of Work' and 'Canary Day') are still a good reason to down tools, as in the UK.  

There are also a few less well-known ones thrown in such as Constitution Day on 6th December and Epiphany on 6th January.  Some pass almost un-noticed to us here in the country, whilst others such as Epiphany are celebrated in style, as in Los Sauces where the Three Wise Men arrive on camels.  Real camels, that is.

However, whilst they are all important for different reasons, one that I particularly like to mark is All Saints' Day on the 1st November.  Way back when (835 AD), the Roman Catholic Church declared the 1st November a Church holiday to honour all the saints, known and unknown.  On this day it is also customary to pray for the all those who have passed away, although not necessarily with sorrow.  On La Palma, as in many other places, we say it with flowers.  

Whilst the rest of the shops on La Palma remain closed, the flower shops are a hive of activity, trying to provide flowers for what amounts to every single and solitary headstone or grave on the whole island.  And the lovely thing about it is that no-one is forgotten or left out - that is after all the whole point.  So, no matter that Don whoever's family moved away years ago and there is nobody left to lay flowers on his grave or to place them tenderly in the little flower holders on the headstone.  All are remembered.  

Remember me

I will be the first to admit that La Palma likes nothing better than a jolly good fiesta. In fact almost anything, noteworthy or not, has its own special day.

To my mind, one of the most inspired and unlikely fiestas – therefore winning my undying admiration – is the Day of the Deceased. Better known to most of us as All Saints Day, it is a time dedicated to those who have gone on before. On this special day, the 1st November, practically the only shop you will find open in an otherwise dormant island is the flourishing florist (it’s an ill wind …). Happily for them, it is a time when Palmerans say it with flowers.

Actually, the Palmerans seem to have developed a wonderful fact of life attitude with regard to death. It is hard to distinguish a group of casually dressed people gathering for a funeral from a jolly club outing. Indeed, the whole process of death here in La Palma, or rather that which immediately follows the final curtain, bears a little examining. ‘Swift’ would probably sum it up quite nicely. From the point where a person is pronounced dead and the funeral taking place is generally a breathtaking 16 to 24 hours. While sometimes traumatically sudden, this does of course cut out agonising decisions as to whether more distant relatives can, could or should attend the funeral and the time consuming selection of appropriate hymns. It does make me think though that long blinks should be avoided at all costs.

A rather improbable venue for a celebration then, the cemetery becomes a hive of activity, with swathes of people turning up every few minutes with arms full of flowers. Groups of cheerful villagers trim, tweak and tidy the blooms into beautiful arrangements, sprays and posies with which they decorate the ancient graves and tiered vaults. In a jamboree of festive colour, a celebration of life gradually blossoms.

And so, on the 1st November, there really is no better place to head than to the cemetery for a bitter-sweet experience of remembering and celebrating all rolled into one.

It really is a question of flower and glory, for ever and ever.

I think we can say Amen to that.