A chance meeting with Ivan from Jungle Farm (local green jackfruit…coming soon!)

I was shopping at Vitafoods for my fresh groceries when who did I bump into, after so many years??

It was Ivan Ho himself, in the flesh! He was there to deliver his Kampung Harvest eggs.

We got talking and I learnt so much (again) from him.

Let me try and remember everything he told me.

Most of his dogs and cats were abandoned by others at his farm. As I’ve written earlier, they cook fresh food for the dogs daily and now I learnt that they also cook for the cats even though the cats naturally hunt on the farm. So I asked what they cooked for the cat, and Ivan said they make rice with cooked fish. All their cats eat rice and fish! But they get their other proteins by hunting rats, lizards and whatever other prey they can find. Kucing makan nasi dan ikan, this is the kampung style!

And here’s something very amazing, their cats and dogs live harmoniously with the ducks and chickens! Even the tiny little chicks are not harmed or hunted by the dogs and cats. I asked Ivan to take photos of his ducks and chickens with his dogs and cats! He says they all sit around together. He didn’t train them to be so. They are just so!

Even ducks get abandoned at his farm. These are probably the Peking Ducks that are bred for the delicacy, but not up to par? They end up at his farm too and get to live on naturally.

And when whatever animal is abandoned nearby, they just know how to make their way to the farm and where there is food. They just know.

His pair of cows have just given birth to two calves – a male and a female. Three months is needed for recovery and after that, the morning milk will be for the calves while the evening milk will be used to make ghee.

And on to Ivan’s plans for the year. He plans to produce sprouts. Ivan says it’s getting more and more difficult to grow vegetables due to the decreasing sunlight and the weather getting colder. So sprouts may be the vegetable of the future. He plans to sell dry sprouts.

And for everyone who is interested in the green jackfruit, here’s great news for you! Ivan knows lots of people are looking for the green jackfruit so he plans to produce dry green jackfruit cubes, which we can use to cook with. That is amazing, because with the green jackfruit powder that we purchase from India, we aren’t certain of its purity. Ivan’s product is going to be green jackfruit cubes, so we can actually see for ourselves that it’s the real jackfruit. His farm has nangka (jackfruit) trees. I am so, so, so looking forward to this!

So much in store for this year, so much to look forward to!!

It’s so inspiring just talking with Ivan, learning from him, even in a chance encounter of a few minutes. “There is so much the land has to give”, he says, and he knows how to harvest these gifts from the land. I certainly don’t! It made me realise how ignorant we are, having chosen to live in our urban concrete jungles.

All Ivan wants is to be able to share these gifts with others through his produce and harvests.

There are even monkeys on his farm and he has seen wildboar too. They all live in harmony. Truly a paradise of Nature.