1. Good Organic Gardening - January-February 2016

GARDENING FOLK | Farouk & Magda Khaled
The urban
gardener
Growing up in crowded Beirut, Farouk Khaled dreamed of owning enough land
to grow whatever he wanted. In Australia, the dream came true
Words & photos Jana Holmer
Farouk Khaled marvels at the memory
of gardening on his tiny balcony in
the Lebanese capital, Beirut — in his
words, “an overbuilt, traffic-clogged
concrete jungle” of 2 million people.
Even in that crowded, war-torn city of
high-rise apartments with no yard space,
Farouk managed to grow up to 20 vegetables
in pots on his balcony under the glaring
Mediterranean sun.
“We grew what we could,” he says.
“Agricultural production was severely
disrupted due to ongoing war. Fishmongers
were hard up selling their produce but we
always managed to buy fresh grapefruit,
olives, lemons, potatoes, bananas, limes,
oranges and peanuts from the local
market stores.
“No one has fields or garden beds in the
inner city but we considered ourselves pretty
lucky to have a balcony garden. What we
could not grow on our balcony was sourced
from local farmers, but I longed one day to
grow my own vegetables and live in peace.
“I dreamed of owning my own land and this
is why I came to Australia, for the opportunity
to enjoy my own green space at last.”
A change of climate
When Farouk traded Beirut — known in its
heyday as the Paris of the Middle East —
for Melbourne, the self-styled Paris of the
South, he and his Egyptian-born wife Magda
eventually came to rest in the suburb of
Pascoe Vale. In contrast to Lebanon’s dry, hot
summers and mild winters, Melbourne gets
plenty of rain in winter, while the summer
heat is tempered by cool nights.
Though once a vast chook farm and noted
for its Cobb & Co waystation, Pascoe Vale,
just 10km north of the CBD, is hardly the
wide-open spaces any more. But Farouk’s
experience with gardening in a confined
space stood him in good stead — there’s
scarcely a fruit or vegetable he doesn’t grow
in his 580m 2 block.
In clay beds along the garden fence
filled with plenty of compost, silverbeet,
beans, garlic, tomatoes, parsley and olives
grow in profusion, together with oregano,
plums, pears, apples, cucumber, turnips
and lemons.
To save space, Farouk espaliers his apple
and peach trees: “They are protected against
wind and kept warm up against the garden
wall during cold winter months.”
He has managed to make the most of his
relatively small plot without cluttering it up.
“The garden needs space to grow, sunlight
26 | Good Organic Gardening