Rara Sekar and Her ‘Lazy Gardening’ Concept
Many people, including public figures, have turned to stay-home hobbies like gardening to spend their time during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Take Rara Sekar, for example. The musician, activist, and also big sister of singer Isyana Sarasvati likes gardening. Along with her husband Ben Laksana, they have been growing plants since 2016 when they were still in New Zealand. At that time, Rara pursued a Master’s degree at Victoria University of Wellington majoring in Cultural Anthropology.
In New Zealand, anyone can do gardening, no matter what you do for a living. In fact, anyone who does not own a garden plot may rent it for gardening.
The couple started gardening by using a space they rented in New Zealand. Initially, they started with a home garden, from making beds with improvised tools, planting seeds, fertilizing, to harvesting their own garden products.
After returning to Indonesia, they continue the activities by making a home garden at home. They often share their gardening activities through photos and videos which are uploaded on their social media.
Rara Sekar’s Lazy Gardening Concept
Gardening is not always about spending all day on your knees and feeling tired. Do you like gardening but never want to be overwhelmed by the work? Then you can adopt Rara Sekar’s lazy gardening concept at home.
Both Rara and Ben are implementing the concept because it is considered suitable for their busy life. By the time it is carried out, you shall only be busy at the beginning of the week preparing plants, sowing seeds, trimming, and watering plants. After that, you can just rely on the state of nature. With this concept, Rara and Ben don’t need to water their plants every time.
But once you decide to implement the concept, you still have to watch your garden closely. In this case, Rara and Ben really learn all things about gardening. They even arrange time to have discussions with farmers.
Their ‘lazy gardening’ concept garden is dominated by plants that they can consume every day. This is what she actually aims from home gardening. Among the plants she grows are spinach, water spinach, eggplant, and chili. They are also seen harvesting watermelons.
Rara chooses to use organic products for plants in her garden, fertilizes and improves nutrients in the soil. She uses organic compost from the accumulation of organic waste in their home. She also does this in the neighborhood, where her neighbors can use and take the compost.
However, if you don’t really understand about composting, you can still do many ways for your garden with this concept. You can use fertilizer products that are widely available in the market.
For example, the products by Pupuk Kaltim, a fertilizer producer in Indonesia whose fertilizer quality has been widely proven. One of the company’s products that you can use is Ecofert fertilizer. It is a type of biofertilizer enriched with superior microorganisms that are useful for increasing soil fertility. The fertilizer can also increase the N and P elements in the soil. Therefore, it can help accelerate plant growth, and increase the absorption of nutrients in the soil.
Making Gardening To Build Connection
For Rara and Ben, gardening is not just about growing and harvesting plants. They can get many positive things, such as building connections with people.
Once, one of the lecturers at college gave her his garden yields. She then realized that exchanging garden crops could help make a connection or communication become more relaxed and friendly.
From gardening, they are also aware of the interaction between themselves and nature. For them, gardening is a meditative activity.
They can interact with their neighbors by sharing the crops. They feel that gardening is more than just a process of planting and harvesting. It is a cycle of life and death. From these activities, they discover the philosophy and meaning of life.