Tropical Agriculture

This is clearly NOT Indiana. When we're on the "highway" there are huge trucks full of burned sugar cane stalks, on their way to the mill; there are young men on little side roads, with wheelbarrows full of huge bamboo stalks, 8 or more inches in diameter, cut into 12 inch lengths. They hollow these out and put flower arrangements inside. A few months of inattention and the jungle has reclaimed your house, yard, car, and anything else left out and unattended. When I was at the diocesan retreat center yesterday, two very proud male turkeys, and some hens and roosters clearly owned the place. Our own yard has avacado, orange, lemon, peach and other unidentified fruit trees. Chayote vines cling to every wall and produce enormous amounts of the bland, pale green vegetable. Mangos lie rotting on the ground. No, It's not Michigan, either.