(1054) Dukun

If you are familiar with tropical fruits, you might have come across duku, langsak and the cross: duku-langsak.

My dad and my husband would consume kilos of them at one sitting. I might eat a few, if they are sweet. Like many tropical fruits like rambutan, durian, tarap, cempedak and nangka, I steer clear of them as should I eat too much of them, I constipate. Seventeen years ago, I visited my uncle who is a farmer. He showed me a new hybrid called dukun. The fruit was unripe, I could not taste it. It is a skinny hard wood tree, thin branches came out of the trunk and they bear tiny fruits in all directions around the thin branch. My uncle said that he had to prune out excess fruits so that the rest would grow into decent size to be sold.

Two years ago, the plumber my land lord sent to repair my kitchen tap told me that most metal rust because I was within two miles of the sea as I lived in a coastal city in north-eastern Borneo. He said certain fruits grow very well in that region, one of the fruits that his wife's farm produced was dukun. I was very excited to hear the name as I did not see much of it sold in the capital city over the years. He told me that the trees that my uncle planted were the old breed, his that the wife planted were a newer generation. My uncle's trees would grow beyond seven feet unless he prunes diligently. His, however, would not grow beyond six feet.

I find it interesting to listen to advances in agriculture. Being at the end of the supply trail as an end consumer, one just dole out money to purchase what one needs. But the scientists, the research organisations, the farmers ... kept on working hard to produce the best to earn their keep.