Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Bachiñ Aai

Bachiñ, diirañ-sañkhañ, taaro. All jungle fruits. The seasons of these fruits were incentives to go to the jungles for any kind of work. It is the season of bachiñ these days.



Some friends, these days, are talking about planting these wild fruit trees in the bamboo gardens - in fact replacing the bamboos with all kinds of fruit trees and other more useful trees like salyo. What about bamboo? They can be grown in the outskirts of the Ziro valley in the areas of traditional sansuñs. Sounds like some people have started thinking!

16 comments:

  1. Hi Aku
    Nice post- it remind me of "Morey/Sansung hoka tiipe ading chiko biido laka baching porte niimi".

    By the way, I took your photo of Baching aai for use in my blog.
    ( http://learntanii.blogspot.com/2009/01/vegetable-hamang.html ).
    Hoping you would not mind it.
    Thanks.

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  2. Go ahead and use it. I note that you have used my photo of senyi apu as well.
    Best wishes.

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  3. Thanks a lot.

    by the way
    Am confused aku !! on your comment in"Lets save tanii" about "NYOKHE"
    Do its name(pronounce/tone) similar/different to that of "black panther/jaguar(NYOKHE)"-

    http://learntanii.blogspot.com/search/label/WILD%20ANIMALS

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  4. Well, when I came down to Shillong a month back and first thing I did was shop for baching, yorkhung, yorkhung hamang, siiyang hamang, hugu hamang ets. We get varities of baching here. All those leafy vegetables and jungle fruits which are so much favoured in Ziro are available here.Infact, what is scarce in Ziro is plenty in shillong. Though it is more expensive.

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  6. Well I wouldn't agree to replacing the bamboo gardens with trees of wild fruits in its entirety. Bamboo in Tanii society has its own uniqueness and importance. Without bamboo Tanii culture would be incomplete in a sense, imagine Murung, Myoko or Dree without bamboo. In days of yore it was desire of every Tanii to have ukko bijii. And bamboo gardens in outskirts of valley would be more difficult to maintain and sustain.

    Having said so trees can be planted in bamboo gardens as far as practicable ( it has been the practice, e:g most pine trees in bamboo garden are result of plantation). But the rule of thumb should be remembered, where there are more trees less bamboo will grow.

    Anyway even now we can find Bachiins fruits in Bijiis

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  7. @taj. Solid concern. We cannot do without bamboo. An American friend was amazed at the variety of ways the Apatanis use bamboo, "You eat bamboo (bamboo shoot), cooked in bamboo (sudu) and eat them with bamboo (piinyu) sitting on the bamboo mat in the bamboo hut!"
    And Ah! the other uses of bamboo!
    On the other hand, bamboo groves today occupy some of the best areas of the Apatani valley. We think we need to re-think this practice since bamboos can grow on the slopes of the hill in the outskirts of the valley as well. Just a thought, though.

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  8. How ironic, a being from afar, could alone make us at least think of it. If only we could be self critical, self assessing, self correcting and self developing!

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  9. hi nice blogs,if u don,t mind m taking ur baching, i feel like having now.

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  10. Sir ji agung takar/chukar lindo kiih

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  11. Are you maintaining the archives of yrs blog ? Otherwise pl do it for future generation . . . Let them learn ours tradition value from it .

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  12. Bamboo is in our blood. We eat bamboo, eat with bamboo, make with bamboo, sleep with bamboo, earn with bamboo so on so forth. We can create bamboo grove in "Sansung" but what about its distance because we have became lazier and lazier do all mannual works? Plus, we all have became obsessed with modern transportation. These days because of economic improvement every body wants to have 'Uko Bije', 'lenngo aji' 'kuchi sansung' 'lewhoo miding' etc.

    However, 'baching sanii' may be planted in 'bije' as well as in 'sansung' as you would not be planting them in large scale for commercial purpose.

    Do you know there are thre 'baching sanii" in 'Kano Putu'. I don't know if it attained its fruiting age right now.

    This I have seen during my last visit to ziro in July, 2009.
    May confirm by making a field visit, if not believed.

    Tago,
    Blr. Kar.

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  13. any idea whats the scientific(or common) name of bachin?

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  14. Hi Buru,

    What about Myrica esculenta (syn: M. nagi), commonly known as Kaphal Tree in India ?
    Check out a picture of its fruits from this link:
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/7875715@N08/458773852/

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  15. PB & Buru,
    The pictures look exactly like bachin, except that I have never seen bachins so red. May be they get red when ripe enough - I don't know.
    Thanks for the link. Let us confirm.

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