Today we introduce to you the man behind the spice terraces. Our skilled gardener who toils over the spice terraces to make them look their very best. Zamani has been with the gardens now for 4 years and he lives in the Malay village in Teluk Bahang.

Teluk Bahang is a renowned fishing village and true enough, Zamani used to be a fisherman on a deep water trawler. After the terrible tsunami in 2004 though, it scared him sufficiently to hang up the proverbial fishing rod and come on down to tend to his second love – plants!

Zamani tending to his basil collection at the spice terraces

Zamani is full of great ideas and together with curator, Kenneth Khoo, they overcome many obstacles to the health of the spices and herbs on the spice terraces. They have cracked their heads over how to beat the matured jungle trees ‘stealing’ all the nutrients from the smaller herbs down below and have come up with a neat system of creating wooden planting boxes, stone barriers and decorative ceramic pots.

Herbs and spices are high maintenance plants which need constant attention – re-potting and pruning and Zamani is just the guy to do it. He can be found every morning cleaning the signboards after a heavy night of rain, pruning away old branches and leaves and planting new herbs and also catching seeds of the spices to germinate both for sale and re-planting.

Happy Zamani with his sawtooth coriander plants

Zamani was recently promoted as Garden Supervisor to be the eyes and ears of Kenny when he is not around. A special touch is needed for the spice terraces and we want to thank and congrtulate Zamani for doing a grand job by making them look tidy, well looked after and the plants looking healthy.

Watch out for our newly planted basil and cekur plot!