By Dr. K. Javeed Nayeem, MD

The trees in and around our city have been in the news, sadly for some very wrong and unhappy reasons, over the past one month. The tragic and very avoidable loss of some of them, has thankfully galvanised a few concerned Mysureans into thinking of not only just protecting the existing ones but also of planting new ones to augment our green heritage, which is the best thing that we can do to ourselves and our posterity too.

Very recently, some residents of the city even had a meeting and a discussion that included an interaction with a knowledgeable tree expert, S. Natesh to prepare a checklist of the trees in our city and chalk out a strategy to protect and propagate them.

This I feel was a very timely and sensible move, considering the fact that the resource person, Natesh is a very well- known and knowledgeable botanist who has written a very informative book called Iconic Trees of India, a handbook which every tree lover or naturalist should possess, as a  travel companion.

It is interesting to note that there are some very rare trees in and around our city and an attempt to catalogue them and record their locations had already been made more than two decades ago, by my close friend K.B Sadanand, who passed away a little more than a decade ago. He too was a very good naturalist, who used to take a great deal of interest in conducting nature walks for school and college students and interested citizens too.

Our friendship had grown strong over the years because of our two common interests, Botany and Photography. We used to meet regularly and exchange notes at length, at the Rainbow Colour Lab on Ashoka Road, owned by another common friend S.A. Waheed, who too is no more. Along with my own teacher and Botany Professor, K.V. Joseph at St. Philomena’s College, Sadanand was my go-to person, whenever I needed help in identifying the many botanical specimens that I was in the habit of collecting and preserving, even long after my college days.

Thankfully, this rather odd habit has not left me to this day and in fact, it now actually borders on becoming qualified to be called a quirk! So, I always come back home from all my local travels, loaded with leaves, twigs, shoots and seeds. Sadly, this activity has its own restrictions when it comes to international travel, due to the strict quarantine stipulations.

Sadanand had prepared two lists of all the rare trees in and around our city, highlighting their characteristics, identifying features and geographic locations. Thankfully, both these are still readily available on the net. What stands out in these two lists is the fact that a good many of these very rare trees are found only in the campus of Sri Ramakrishna Vidyashala, which not only becomes a matter of pride for that institution but also a tribute to the foresighted efforts of all the stalwarts who have nurtured and brought it up over the years.

Talking of rare trees and my own fascination for them, takes me back to my school days at St. Philomena’s High school, when we had the book, The Coral Island, as our English non-detailed text, in the eighth standard. That book, written in 1857 by the Scottish writer R.M. Ballantyne, still lives in me and I still live in it so much that I keep reading it again and again, every few years, just to refresh the joy that comes out of it! That was the kind of magic it had cast on me with its portrayal of the adventures of three young British schoolboys marooned on a tiny South Pacific Island, after a shipwreck.

Part of the magic was due to the element of adventure that was inherent in the book and an equal part of it was due to the way our English teacher, Mr. M. Manuel explained and elaborated every incident, every twist and turn and even mentally portrayed for us, every scene in the story, over a term of one full year.

The three boys discover many coconut trees on the island, hitherto unseen by them on mainland Britain and are thrilled that such trees exist which provide ready-made lemonade which they can drink and sweet coconut pulp which they can eat too! But my classmates and I were mighty amused and surprised that they had not seen such a commonplace tree like a coconut palm, in their land!

The second tree they discover growing in abundance on the island is the breadfruit tree, which can provide the staff-of-life to them. The discovery of these two trees dramatically turns their despair into hope, with the knowledge that they can now somehow survive, until help comes their way. And, with this turn of events in the story, my own gnawing anxiety about the ultimate fate of those three boys, suddenly turned to hope! But, since I had never seen a breadfruit tree in my life till then, the mention of a tree from which bread could be plucked and eaten, seemed simply fantastic and I was now fired with overpowering desire to see it.

So, after the end of that class, I approached my teacher and asked him if such a breadfruit tree really existed and where I could see one. After a log pause, during which he held his hand to his chin and looked down at the ground, he asked me to come to his house, the next Sunday at five in the evening. I thought that he might show me a picture of that tree in a book he might be having and at the stroke of five on Sunday, I went to his house, which was on my way to the school and which still stands there unchanged, to this day.

On finding me at his door, he brought out his old bicycle, mounted it and with a disarming smile, asked me to hop on its carrier. He then pedalled towards the Bangalore Road, past the Central Jail, which was then the extreme northern end of the city and into the campus of St. Philomena’s College, a good one mile away. Once there, he took me into the tiny quadrangle of the main building and showed me a sprawling tree, with large, lobed leaves and round spiny fruits, that resembled miniature jack fruits and announced that it was my own breadfruit tree!

He then told me that the building where we were standing was the home of Rev. Fr. Rene Feuga, the first Bishop of Mysore, who donated it to start the college there. Little did I know then that I was standing on some very hallowed ground, which, in just a few years, would become my Alma Mater too! That was then my own Coral Island and my own South Sea adventure, thanks to the kindness of a teacher who thought that one curious student’s pleasure, was worth all his pain! May his noble soul rest in peace. Amen!

e-mail: [email protected]