Lost Singapore childhood: 02 (Picking your own coconut) (Singapore)

 

These days, when children (in Britain or Western affluent countries anyway) invite a friend or two back home, they’d more than likely be playing a computer game, or watching a children’s film on a big TV screen.

    When I was 11, the two siblings immediately above me who were sent to live on Grandma’s coconut plantation in Tampines would invite friends home to go and pick their own coconuts.

    Equipment:  

1. a very long pole — often two bamboo poles tied together end-to-end to make it doubly long, to reach the bunches of coconut up in the tree;
2. a sickle tied to the end of the doubly long bamboo pole — for cutting free the cluster of coconuts;
3. a parang (a chopper knife that's a bit like a machete) — for lopping off the top 1/6th or so of the coconut husk to reach the hard shell, and for making a hole in the hard shell to let the coconut water out; later, after the coconut water is drunk or tipped into the bucket, for splitting the hard shell to get at the flesh;
4. a bucket (or two) — to drain off whatever coconut water that can’t be drunk on the spot, to be taken home;
5. a spoon for everyone — to scoop out the flesh for eating on the spot.

    Armed with the above, we’d march off to the trees, which were all around Grandma’s thatched house, so it was no great distance to walk in the tropical humidity — in theory (if you find the right-age bunch fairly early).  

    We had to look for the right-age coconut:  too young, and the flesh would be like jelly, not quite developed; too old, and the flesh would be hard and crunchy, more for grating and squeezing to get coconut milk for making curries and other sweet things like puddings and drinks.  So, it took a bit of specialist knowledge, or you’d be bringing down bunches of coconuts that are no good for this kind of outing.

    The steps:

1. Walk around and look up at the clusters of coconuts.
2. Once the right-age bunch has been found, hook the sickle onto the stalk of the bunch — this is the tricky bit for a teenager, who may not have the strength.
3. Once the sickle blade is in place, pull with all your might, let go of the pole, and RUN AWAY from the falling coconuts and the long pole.
4. Return to the spot, and take your pick, using your eyes to ascertain the right age from close quarters.
5. Use the parang to lop off the top 1/6th or so of the coconut — you will know when you can see the shell.  If you lop off too much, you end up with a big gaping hole, spilling most of the coconut water inside, so this part also requires a bit of skill and judgement.
6. Make a hole with the parang tip in the shell, big enough to hold up the coconut and tip out the water into your upraised mouth.  Drink all you can/want, tip the rest into the bucket to take home.  (A Chinese cultural practice belief:  coconut water is yin [of yin and yang]; drinking too much of it, especially for young people who are not fully grown yet, will soften/weaken the knee/leg bones.)
7. Use the parang to split open the coconut — this is the stage when you get final confirmation of your judgement (of the age of the coconut for this purpose).  If the coconut is too young, you get jelly-consistency flesh, so you will have to go and beg some off the others in the group.  Ditto if it’s too old and the flesh is hard and crunchy, which cannot be scooped out with a spoon — you’ll need to crack the shell and prise the hard flesh off the shell, which is a tricky task that requires a bit of experience.  The older flesh type can at least be taken home for the adults to grate and squeeze the milk out, to make a curry or some sweet pudding kind of thing.

    Writing the above, I can see a replay of the scene as if it were only last week.  Not something the modern-day Singapore child can experience anymore.

(Singapore, 1960s)

*parang: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parang_(knife)