Valentines in Bulacan

My L Arch 25 class

Sea of greenery

I spent Valentines not with one date but with 27 of my students on a trip to Bulacan.  The landscape subject I am teaching them is L Arch 25 or softscape planting material. Therefore it is inevitable for us to go on roadtrip and expose them to real actual plants.  Not all can be learned in the confines of the small classroom and the nurseries of Tabang and Malolos would be a better setting to learn more of plants they could use for landscape purposes - much more than just seeing pictures and downloading them over the internet.

Diospyros  ferrea

The class looking at Cordyline varieties

It was already 9 am when we reached the Tabang exit of NLEX. But the next 2 hours saw us hopping from one nursery to another.  The students did not stop snapping their cameras for pictures of the multitude of plants grown and sold there.  I myself found and discovered new plant materials that I have never seen before. But I was more elated to find that along with the usual native of miyagos (Osmoxylon lineare), kamuning (Murraya paniculata), arius (Podocarpus costalis) and tsaang gubat (Carmona retusa), another beautiful Philippine bush - bantulinao (Diospyros ferrea) is becoming visible.

Under the millionaire's vine with our guide, Lea

Barasoain Church

The class was complaining that they were having information overload. One nursery we went to, Kariz Garden, had around 6 hectares of planting area, exposing the class to the hot sun and endless seas of greenery. Their cameras ran out of storage space and I never ran out of queries regarding common names and scientific Latin. When we finished, they were all exhausted, exasperated by hunger and dehydration. 

Break at Kabisera

As a break and a treat, we passed though the iconic Barasoain Church and had a hearty lunch at nearby Kabisera Restaurant.  We had our fill of bottomless cold iced tea and a sampling of their specialties.  The Kabisera chicken and sisig are a must.  Yum!

At a fountain in Barasoain

The day was capped with a visit to Bulacan State University.  My class watched their counterparts, headed by UP MTLA student and  BSU professor Madonna Danao, while they are having their design defense.  The BSU immersion was short but at least they got to interact with other landscape students outside of the U.P. system. 

BSU students making their presentation

Overall it was a fruitful and tiring day, made bad only by the worst Valentines Day traffic ever when we reached Manila.  That did not entirely dampen my spirits but made hit the sack early when I finally reached home sweet home.  But the experience made me again excited to blg about it, a day after.

The UP and BSU landscape architecture students with Prof. Madonna Danao