A buddy of mine married a Colombian girl, and any more they end up travelling back to the Homeland a couple times a year. He came back recently and left her and the kids down with the fam for a couple extra weeks- we got to talking, and I got him to hit up his old lady to bring me back some seeds. She's not a gardener he says. She doesn't eat hot stuff he says. Doesn't matter I say- just ask her to head down to the market and buy a couple fresh raw chiles that she'd think I'd like, cut the seeds out, wrap 'em in a paper towel and bring them back. Seemed simple and harmless enough, right?
Let me reiterate- this woman considers calling ahead for reservations 'making dinner' and just because someone is from South America does not mean they are genetically predisposed to enjoying chiles.
So a week or so goes by, and he tells me she's WICKED pissed at me and her entire family in Colombia hates me. Great- there's another country I can't go back to. I ask him what the hell- he says she'd gone down to the market, bought 2 different chiles, brought them home and her and her mother went to cut them up in the kitchen. He said they were both still MFing me and him on account of them all getting burnt up from this ordeal. Not having talked to Olga, I have no freaking idea if they were wrestling in the chiles or what.
So another week or so goes by and I get an airpack in the mail from Colombia. YAY. I rip it apart with wild abandon only to find two ziploc baggies full of the nastiest wadded up paper towel, all stained brown and black with some seriously funky looking slime mold fuzz scud growing on it. Space alien dead raccoon vomit looking nasty. Bless her non-gardening heart, and beggars like I was can't be choosers, so I gently pulled the funktowel out of each baggie so as not to upset any flesh-eating spores that may have been germinating in there, and placed them in the basement over my lights where there's negative humidity- hey, who knows. After a couple days drying time, I spread the towels apart to find what was left- it looked like she had skinned the chile, leaving not only the placenta but a ton of the meat as well. Again, bless her heart for the work! I got to digging around and managed to pick out a few seeds that weren't black and hairy, soaked 'em a little overnight, tossed 'em in some Rapid Rooter plugs, and 2 weeks later-
BAM!
I got me some fresh strain Colombian Mysteries growing good and healthy strong!
I'm still not sure exactly what they are, but I've managed to get all 4 seeds I planted to germinate!
I've since transplanted all of them into seperate 5" squarepots, and when I left for work last week they were all doing great. Each of the freakbaggies had a chunk of a label in them, written in spanish of course- but they both had 'Aji' in the title. We shall see, we shall see!
Let me reiterate- this woman considers calling ahead for reservations 'making dinner' and just because someone is from South America does not mean they are genetically predisposed to enjoying chiles.
So a week or so goes by, and he tells me she's WICKED pissed at me and her entire family in Colombia hates me. Great- there's another country I can't go back to. I ask him what the hell- he says she'd gone down to the market, bought 2 different chiles, brought them home and her and her mother went to cut them up in the kitchen. He said they were both still MFing me and him on account of them all getting burnt up from this ordeal. Not having talked to Olga, I have no freaking idea if they were wrestling in the chiles or what.
So another week or so goes by and I get an airpack in the mail from Colombia. YAY. I rip it apart with wild abandon only to find two ziploc baggies full of the nastiest wadded up paper towel, all stained brown and black with some seriously funky looking slime mold fuzz scud growing on it. Space alien dead raccoon vomit looking nasty. Bless her non-gardening heart, and beggars like I was can't be choosers, so I gently pulled the funktowel out of each baggie so as not to upset any flesh-eating spores that may have been germinating in there, and placed them in the basement over my lights where there's negative humidity- hey, who knows. After a couple days drying time, I spread the towels apart to find what was left- it looked like she had skinned the chile, leaving not only the placenta but a ton of the meat as well. Again, bless her heart for the work! I got to digging around and managed to pick out a few seeds that weren't black and hairy, soaked 'em a little overnight, tossed 'em in some Rapid Rooter plugs, and 2 weeks later-
BAM!
I got me some fresh strain Colombian Mysteries growing good and healthy strong!
I'm still not sure exactly what they are, but I've managed to get all 4 seeds I planted to germinate!
I've since transplanted all of them into seperate 5" squarepots, and when I left for work last week they were all doing great. Each of the freakbaggies had a chunk of a label in them, written in spanish of course- but they both had 'Aji' in the title. We shall see, we shall see!
