Traffic / Alma Reyes

Fortune Plums

While the world watches in despair and anxiety as dark images of war and suffering flicker before our eyes, sometimes, we can’t help but close the curtains and seek another path of resilience, perhaps, by calling the early rush of spring.

Photo by Alma Reyes

Plum blossoms play exactly that role—to transcend between the harsh winter and hopeful spring. In fact, I caught my first glimpse of plum blossoms in late December last year at Atami Plum Garden. The spacious park, opened in 1886, is known to reveal Japan’s earliest plum blooms. You can find about 60 plum varieties and over 460 plum trees scattered all over the premises. Last February, I took the chance to savor these delicate flowers at the Ikegami Plum Garden, where around 370 plum trees had already begun to show their pink, white, and yellow fragrant blooms.

Ume may appear as second fiddle to the sakura, but they have long existed for centuries. They were regarded as the preferred ornamental flowers during the Heian period until sakura became prominent. Like the sakura, they also come in several varieties: yae-ume with five petals and shidare-ume, the weeping plum branches. Plums are said to be planted facing northeast, the direction that invites misfortune, to ward off evil spirits. In these times of continuous turbulence, we may need heaps of plums to last throughout the year.

©Alma Reyes

Photo by Alma Reyes

Alma Reyes

Jeepney Press