By Wilfred Pilo
KUCHING, March 1: Don’t let the ‘buah keranji’ fade into time and remain stagnant as a memory, says fruit and vegetable seller Kimlee Ajis.
The 58-year-old lamented that ‘buah keranji’, or tamarind plum, is fading from people’s minds as the fruit tree is disappearing—which he said could be due to rural folks opting to plant more lucrative cash crops.
Hailing from Sarasot in the Bau district, Kimlee, who has a stall at the Bandar Riyal Market Kota Samarahan, shared that he could not find such a fruit tree anymore in his village and worried it might have faded in time.
“In these last ten years, there is none in my village as people had cleared their orchard land for oil palm and other lucrative cash crops,” he told DayakDaily.
Kimlee said that many, even the locals, had not seen or tasted the fruit—and opined that some fruit farmers could consider planting it in their orchards.
“For those who do not know, the brownish fruit pulp is sweet-sour in taste, a little powdery, and some species are ‘sticky’.
“The small darkish oval-shaped fruit is about an inch or slightly longer and has brittle skin that easily cracks. I remember when we were young, we carried a pocketful as a snack when it was still plenty.”
Kimlee, who obtains this rare seasonal fruit from a local supplier, sells it at RM35 per kilogramme. — DayakDaily
