Saturday, July 09, 2011

Putrajaya Floria 2011

I have just come back from Putrajaya after spending the day at this year's Flower Show or Floria 2011. This is the best flower show I have yet seen in Malaysia. It is certainly full of colourful flowers and some designs are finally reaching international standards.

In the evening, at 8 to 10 pm there was a splendid parade of decorated floats on Putrajaya Lake -- a first for Malaysia -- accompanied by fireworks and music. The concept and technology were copied from Soochow, China, and there was a team from Soochow in attendance to see how Malaysia was doing. Pretty good for a first attempt! Fourteen gaily decorated barges took part, sponsored by various states and corporations, including one from Brunei. We were told that one barge tipped over and sank during preparation.

The best time to go is morning when the plants are fresh. In the afternoon many plants are visibly drooping. They perk up again in the evening when it is cooler. Those going in the evening will not regret staying on for the float parade.

The show is for 9 days, which I think is far too ambitious. The plants are all in pots and many of them will have to be replaced from day to day. By the fifth day some of the exhibitors may run out of replacement plants.

The political protests in Kuala Lumpur today may have reduced the number of people at Floria 2011 but even so the car parks were full, and the evening crowd was dense.

7 comments:

Autumn Belle said...

This year there are many varieties of flowers, especially the annuals. I like the nice fragrance from the roses and daylilies that fills the air. I had the chance to see many types of roses.

JAMALLUDIN said...

Thank You Dr Ng for the comment on our flower show. However we still new in this show. Lots of things that need to be improve for futere. Anyway Thanks you again for visiting the show.

Jamalludin@ppj.gov.my

Anonymous said...

Dr Ng I hope it is OK to ask this, in your blog. I was in a park in KL and came across a grassy area covered with hundreds of these red-orange fruits that had fallen. I asked a number of locals what they were, no one knew, but they stated they are probably poisonous as the birds, squirrels, etc didn't seem to be eating them. I took a picture of the fruit:
http://s3.postimage.org/7wo9zk4ev/mangosteen_what.jpg

My first thought was Kokum, but was told it isn't.
I believe it is in the Mangosteen family as inside and out it is similar (rind, fruit, seed, oval leaves on the 20'+ tree), only the bottom end has a knob, a bit radish shape.

There were also a few flowers that had fallen- creme color, tiny, with a nice smell.

I did eat a piece :D, it was sour.

Just didn't make sense to me to plant these trees in a public park if they bear poisonous fruit.

Any idea what it could be?

Thank you very much

Dr Francis Ng said...

From the picture, it is indeed a species of Garcinia, related to the mangosteen Garcinia mangostana. We have 50 forest species of Garcinia and it is difficult to identify them on the basis of fruits only. If you let me know where you saw the tree, I will try to locate it and get seeds for FRIM to grow.

Anonymous said...

Fabulous. If you would please send me your e.m.a.i.l so that I may send you the details and intro myself.
My e.m.a.i.l is here:
http://www.freeimagehosting.net/t/a7f5a.gif

(thwart the robots :D )

I'll reply with the subject "mangosteen what" so you'll know it's not spam.

Anonymous said...

I haven't heard back from you yet. I have returned to the park and collected the few that I could find still, I'm saving them for you, it has already stopped fruiting. They sure smell good :D

Dr Francis Ng said...

Anon, I was not able to reach you at the web address you gave. Please call me at 019-3820012.