P-Patch Community Gardens

Ferdinand

Growing Families

High on Beacon Hill, on the freezing last Saturday in February, an annual ritual takes place. Ferdinand P-Patch sits between spiky electrical towers on a long greenway of Seattle City Light property; a fence with red and white recycled stop sign posts surrounds the gardeners. Ferdinand P-Patch gardeners, immigrants from the highland of Laos and Thailand, industriously grow the food crops of their homeland for extended families and community. Each year we greet one another, gratified to see the same happy faces, pleased to see the children bigger than last year, glad to see new babies in their colorful costumes. In a few short weeks the site will be transformed from a sleeping winter garden into an abundance of greens. Small children will scamper between the row as their mothers harvest bitter melon, gai lohn, gai choy, yard long beans, and fragrant cilantro.