Bank Chairwoman also runs an educational garden destination

ESTABLISHED IN JULY 1916 during the American occupation, the Philippine National Bank (PNB) had an initial mandate of providing services to the country’s industry and agriculture, as well as to support the government’s economic development efforts.

Nowadays, it remains one of the largest banks in the country, with a wide array of competitive banking products to answer to the diverse needs of its huge clientele.

One of its key persons, however, plays a different role from the one she already has in the bank.

PNB Chairwoman Flor G. Tarriela also runs her own garden in Antipolo, Rizal that serves as a bird and butterfly sanctuary as well as an educational destination composed of different gardens that have their own specialty.

“Flor’s Garden is more than five hectares, surrounded by a creek. [It is] a wonderful gift from God! Birds and butterflies stay in the garden because we practice the natural way of gardening, no use of chemicals. The garden is also a hoya sanctuary with various species of hoya plants and other ornamentals,” the chairwoman said.

Some crops that grow in the garden include medicinal plants, with fruit-bearing trees such as mangoes, star apple, cashew, rambutan, marang, and more.

Moreover, her garden also promotes wellness to its guests through its numerous amenities, along with seminars that focus on living a healthy lifestyle.

INSIDE FLOR’S GARDEN

According to Tarriela, Flor’s Garden teaches, practices, and shares ideas to their guests so they can become more aware of the environment and be more active in protecting it.

The garden is an educational destination for different gardens with different specializations ranging from edible plants, medicinal plants, to ornamentals.

First is Jardin ng Buhay, which is a garden where edible and medicinal plants grow. Another garden that follows this idea is Botika Garden, or God’s Pharmacy, where they have medicinal plants and weeds that have useful healing properties.

“We call the weeds ‘weedicinals’ because of their medical properties,” Tarriela said.

Other than promoting medicinal plants, Flor’s Garden also has an advocacy of ‘No Filipino should be hungry.’ Their Kitchen Garden teaches guests about weeds that are edible, or ‘weedibles’, and how to identify them to show that one’s own backyard has the potential to grow food.

“Our in-house doctor, former Secretary of Health Jaime Galvez Tan, helps us promote this advocacy because we believe that health is wealth. We even conduct quarterly seminars for wellness,” the PNB chairwoman said.

Having recognized the need for edible and medicinal plants to maintain a healthy lifestyle, Tarriela also knows that these are not the only elements that could improve a person’s well-being.

To complete the package, Flor’s Garden also houses the Grow Fresh Air Garden where indoor and outdoor plants are located to purify the air. Meanwhile, the Bamboo Forest in the garden gives the guest a chance to bathe with bamboo to improve their memory and combat stress.

Aside from bolstering the importance of health and wellness through plants, Flor’s Garden also has educational gardens where guests can learn how to distinguish plants and how to care for them.

The wet and dry garden houses plants that live in water and those that don’t while a garden that uses various types of soils and conditioners sets an example on how the different soil conditioners are used to improve the soil’s nutrients.

Other amenities found in Flor’s Garden are a resthouse, an airconditioned mini conference room, a bamboo forest, fishponds, a hanging bridge, along with a vermiculture and concoction area.

“You can also exercise in Flor’s Garden by following the hiking trail that passes the bamboo forest to the hanging bridge, and to the vermiculture and concoction house where we prepare our natural fertilizers,” the chairwoman said.

Livestock such as native pigs and chickens are also raised in the garden following natural farming methods.

All these elements found in Tarriela’s garden were born out of a love for gardening before it eventually opened to the public in 2012.

THE HISTORY BEHIND FLOR’S GARDEN

For one to know how Flor’s Garden came to be, Tarriela shared that it began with her parents and her father’s bid for candidacy.

“In 1963, my father Benjamin Gozon from Malabon ran as governor of Rizal. He had no political history but he had a career as the director of the Bureau Mines for 14 years among other things. My mother, Carolina Gozon, went along with his candidacy but prayed hard that he would lose because she did not like a politician’s life. Well, her prayers were answered,” the PNB chairwoman said.

She added that losing the campaign was related to the establishment of Flor’s Garden because during the elections, there were jeeps used for the campaign.

“One of the political leaders [asked] my father if he can exchange his lot in Antipolo for a jeep. My father agreed as it was the least he could do for his campaign leader who felt bad that their candidate lost,” Tarriela said.

Eventually, other leaders found out about it and also wanted to own a jeep in exchange for their lots. When the jeeps finally ran out, there were more leaders wanting to now sell their lots for cash.

“My father talked to my mother, Coralina ‘Arling’ Gozon, who didn’t know if it was a good idea, so she started to pray. With her patis business, she prayed that if it is Gods’ will for her to buy the land, the leaders will ask for an amount she can provide them: the sale proceeds of her patis for that day,” Tarriela said.

As if it was fated, when the leaders came to make their bid, they asked for the exact amount that was equal to patis sales for that day. With more leaders offering their lots for money, Tarriela’s mother acquired several hectares of land for her family.

“I have three other siblings and each of us were given five hectares to develop. Beside Flor’s Garden is Carolina Bamboo Garden which is owned by my sister Kay Jimenez, the Bamboo Queen, and across the street are my two brothers Ben and Henry,” the

PNB chairwoman said.

DEVELOPING THE FARM TO WHAT IT IS TODAY

Before Flor’s Garden became the educational garden destination that it is today, it had humble beginnings, with Tarriela having little knowledge about the plants growing in the garden.

“My mother planted talinum in our home garden. It wasn’t an ornamental plant so I thought of throwing it away,” she said.

However, when Tarriela had the chance to visit a famous landscape artist, Yuyung Lao. She visited his garden with Noni Dolera, Mameng Florento and Maur Lichauco.

“Maur saw a talinum plant and said that this plant is rich in vitamin C and it saved her family along with others during the Japanese occupation as it grew fast and anywhere,” Tarriela said.

She suddenly realized that she was planning to remove the talinum in her garden due to ignorance. She then started exploring the possibility that there are many other plants similar to talinum which are edible and beneficial but underrated.

“I asked Noni, our walking encyclopedia, if there are other common plants--even weeds, that are edible. He named quite a few so I started writing them down and I realized that others should know about this,” the PNB chairwoman said.

To share this information with others, Tarriela wrote a book called Oops-- Don’t Throw Those Weeds Away with Dolera.

From there, she started collecting the common plants written in the book to be placed in her garden.

“Guests in the garden usually gravitate around the weeds garden. Eventually, the garden became an attraction especially when we started training on natural farming and providing wellness seminars with Jimmy Galvez Tan; and the rest is history,” Tarriela shared.

FOLLOWING NATURAL FARMING PRACTICES

“We follow the natural way of farming and the JADAM way,” Tarriela said.

JADAM is a set of easy, low-cost farming principles and practices. It’s also a group of organic farmers that was established in 1991 by a chemist and horticulturist named Youngsang Cho.

According to Tarriela, Flor’s Garden uses various natural inputs such as IMOs (indigenous microorganisms) to provide nutrients to the plants and soil, FPJs (fermented plant juice) for greener leaves,

FAA (fish amino acids) to give nutrients and amino acids to plants, OHN (oriental herbal nutrient) for strengthening weak plants, calcium bones and eggshells to induce flowering, and vermicast as a natural fertilizer.

Other than using natural farming inputs, Tarriela said that the secret to growing plants can also be found in the soil.

“The soil is alive. It’s not the green thumb that can only grow plants but rather it’s the soil. If the soil is full of nutrients, the plants will grow. That’s why we use soil conditioners in planting, the chairwoman said.

Some of the soil conditioners that they use include coir dust to maintain moisture, rice hull to avoid water logging during the rainy season, and gravel for plants that need a lot of water but without risking waterlogging.

OVERCOMING ROADBLOCKS

Because it didn’t start as a business, Flor’s Garden encountered some challenges financially during its early years.

“In 2008, with the subprime financial crises, Finex (or the Financial Executives of the Philippines) asked me to talk about what to do with increases like this. I realized I need to give up my garden as it's costing me a lot of money,” Tarriela shared.

However, she had second thoughts when the president of Spouses of Heads of Mission (SHOM) and wife of the European Union Ambassador, Brigette McDonald, invited her to talk about her garden and its benefits.

“I realized that gardening has many benefits such as solving the global problem of poverty, garbage, health, and more. So I decided to slowly open it up to friends and guests. By 2012, Flor’s Garden was born,” the PNB chairwoman said.

To stay in business, Flor’s Garden sells cuttings from as low as P5 to 20,000, depending on the plant. It also sells farm inputs and garden kits to help encourage their visitors and others to begin their gardening journey.

“We want to give hope. We advocate healing and wellness by growing your own healthy food with no use of chemicals. The most important is to plant what we eat! The food that we eat is our medicine because prevention is better than cure. Be healthy!,” Tarriela said.

Photos courtesy of Flor’s Garden