🌴 Exploring Ovambos' Garden 🌴

At Traditional Homestead "Eumbo" 🛖

The Ovambos of northern Namibia cultivate and utilize a diverse array of plants around their traditional homesteads, serving nutritional, medicinal, and cultural purposes.
On their fields, the most distinctive staple crop is pearl millet 🌾 ("omahangu"). Besides that, they also cultivate a range of other crops, such as sorghum ("oilyavala"), cow peas 🫘 ("omakunde"), pumpkins 🎃 and squashes ("omanyangwa", "itila"), melons (watermelons "enuwa" 🍉 and "etanga" for cooking), groundnuts 🥜 ("efukwa").
In their garden, various veggetables and spices can be spotted growing on the sandy ground: Hibiscus sabdariffa 🌺 ("emutete"), gourds ("omindo", etc), tomato 🍅 ("etama"), African basil 🌿 ("Endjikaui"), wild garlic/society garlic (Tulbaghia violacea, "Elume Linyika"), chili pepper 🌶️ ("ondungu"), just to name a few.
Also, fruits trees line up betwen the space in or outside the homestead, such as the iconic makalani palm tree 🌴 ("omulunga"), fig tree ("omukwiyu"), marula tree ("omuongo").
Apart from wild fruit trees, people also enjoy seasonal wild leafy vegetables. Among them the most popular ones are Cleome gynandra ("omboga/ombidi"), Amaranthus thunbergia ("ekwakwa") and the flowers of Aloe zebrina Baker ("ekundu").

Go Check More About "Eumbo" 🛖

🍃 This page was built by Liu Hu 🍃