Chapter 29 Collecting Rubber Seeds

During the months of February,March or April were wintering months,rubber trees shed all their leaves be replaced with newer ones.New flowers will also bloomed.Coming with it will be the dropping of rubber seeds.Those were the days if one walked bare footed in rubber estates can be hurt by the shell of the seeds.

As small boys Fabian,Joe and little brother Francis will go rubber seeds hunting in small holdings.Those days rubber seeds were from huge seedling trees so the seeds produced varied from tree to tree.That path the way to enjoy playing with them because they were of different sizes,different thickness of seeds and of different seed coats.

Whereas now a days the rubber seeds were from the same budded clone,should the whole field were of the same clone and therefore the seeds were all similar.Similar in size,shape,same thickness of shell,and same color and coatings.The strength of the seeds were also similar,so no fun playing with them,many a time the shell thickness were very thin and fragile.

In the days when the rubber trees were seedlings,Fabian and gang used to collect them for competitions.What competition?Very simple just crushing each others seeds to see whose were more superior in not breaking up.

Fabian and company will venture to nearby rubber holdings.One such day at small holding as they searching for rubber seeds,their friend Tim came out of his house demanding all to stop collecting near his house."Hoy! all of you,do not collect my rubber seeds",said Tim.

"Rubbish","It is not your tree",shouted Joe.
"Yeah",all agreed."It is beside my house so it is mine",said Tim.
"Return what you have collected to me",requested Tim.
"No,we would not",said Francis.
"Hold it,Tim,we are all friends,what is so big about these rubber seeds?",said Joe.
'But",said Tim,"this tree produced the strongest rubber seeds".
"Aha! that is the reason you do not want us to collect its seeds.You alone wanted to be champion all the time.".
"Now that we know your secret,we will come everyday to search for them",said Fabian.
"Come on we all are very good friends,why allow some rubber seeds make us quarrel?",said Joe.
"Yeah",all agreed.You do your collection and we do ours.that way I think very fair,for you are living here and can collect all the time",said Joe.
"Whenever we come back and if we find any,that will be our luck,right?",said Fabian.

"Okay,lah,for all of us are great friends",replied Tim.