Me and my orchid stalk

When I was small and still living on the island, my father used to grow this orchid plant from a pot. The plant towered above me. It must've been at least six or seven feet but to the eyes and mind of a six-year-old kid, the plant looked gigantic enough. If it had grown much taller, surely, this six-year-old would've tried climbing it ala Jack and his beanstalk.

That was my first encounter with orchids. Unfortunately, through the next decades, I had never taken much of an interest in orchids although my father continued to potter around with his small pots of orchid plants at our house on mainland Penang.

But everything changed more than a year ago. When my wife and I were in Kuala Lumpur to attend a convention, we spotted a young man at The Curve selling pots of orchids. Two of them caught our eyes. Since then, we've have countless days of joy watchng them grow and flower.


Recently, I had noticed that one of them was already growing out of its pot. The pseudobulbs were branching out and so were its roots. It was time to re-pot the plant but how on earth should I do it? The extent of my orchid knowledge was to watch them grow and flower only.

Luckily, Dr Teoh Eng Soon came to my rescue. He is the author of this great coffee table book called Orchids Of Asia.

If you ever need a book that tells you everything about growing orchids in the tropics, especially this weather, this is it! By the way, he is a gynaecologist in Singapore.

This is how my plant looked like after I followed his advice to cut it between the fifth and sixth pseudobulbs. Reason? The front section will continue growing new pseudobulbs and roots while the back bulbs, free of the front bulbs, should grow new pseudobulbs too.


Though it's been about a month since I cut the plant and I've yet to see growth in the back bulbs, I'm not discouraged. In fact, I'm heartened that the front bulbs are continuing to sprout new roots. It'll be time to re-pot the front bulbs.