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Refuge

Muscat's little-known gardens

written by Nicola Shipway photographed by Syed Fasiuddin

"At the foot of the bank is a roundel so densely planted that it calls to mind a Persian carpet"

For a city built on rock, Muscat is well stocked with greenery. In addition to the date palms ubiquitous to Arabia, the capital is a patchwork of flower beds, groves of blossoming trees and expanses of lawn. Low-growing plants scramble over the ground, climbing plants clamber over walls, and flowery scents hang in the air after dark. Few people fail to observe the ranks of trees lining many of MuscatÕs main roads they are one of the first things to greet tourists emerging from Seeb International Airport in fact. But Muscat has countless lesser-known public gardens, too: pockets of lovingly tended green that escape the notice of most visitors and some inhabitants, but which contribute much to the overall prettiness of the city.

These green spaces represent a triumph of technology over weather. Plants native to the region are able to resist searing temperatures and extensive periods of drought, but they are limited in number. Gardeners are as greedy for plants as artists are for paint, so it is no surprise that gardens in the sultanate contain specimens that originally hailed from cooler or less arid climates such as the Mediterranean or South America. Most of these treasures only endure the assault of summer with assiduous irrigation forget to water and your stock is probably doomed. The bright annuals that from October until March illuminate so many roadside borders in Muscat are planted out by the armies of municipal workers only after summer has declined.

Colour and complexity
Victorian-style borders

Among the borders to be well-nigh incandescent with colour at this time of year are those in a relatively unfrequented garden on Qurm Heights Road. Equipped with two timber pavilions, ugly concrete benches and drum-shaped planters, slides and a swing, it is notable primarily for its eye-popping, almost Victorian-style planting in
the terraced borders and at the bottom of the gentle slope. A path, punctuated on either side by spires of cadmium-yellow canna lilies, rises between these terraced beds, which are filled with low-growing, sprawling mounds of orange, purple and pink Ð things like Catharanthus rosea, the floriferous Madagascar periwinkle, which has pink or white flowers; the flame-coloured Gazania splendens; or succulent, ground-covering ice plants. At the foot of the bank is a roundel so densely planted that it calls to mind an intricately patterned Persian carpet.

Geometry and topiary
Persian-inspired designing

Elsewhere are other public gardens that are closer in spirit to the Persian or Islamic traditions of garden design than to the polychromatism redolent of Victorian parks. The roots of traditional Islamic gardens lie in the plains of ancient Persia. The Persian
garden was an enclosed space the English word paradise derives from the Avestan pairidaeza, meaning enclosure. It was not until these gardens reached Spain, via the Moors, that they began to be outward looking, a response to the less-hostile surrounding landscape. Persian gardens usually featured water fountains, rills and reflective pools, as well as irrigation for plants (such as roses, jasmine and other, often scented delights) and shade-making trees, pavilions or trellises. Figs, olives, pomegranates and date palms have long been popular in Islamic gardens, as have symmetrical shapes (octagons, rectangles, stars and polygons) and a geometric arrangement that often divides the garden into quadrants.

Geometry is the linchpin in a delightful public garden on the corniche in Mutrah, which is effectively divided in three. At one end is a palm garden, featuring 13 palms each encircled at the base by a collar of stones. At the opposite end of the garden is a grassy expanse made interesting by the addition of three humps in the ground; the middle tump is aligned with the path that runs the length of the garden. The central section is a knot garden a bold, geometric design constructed from trimmed hedges of Clerodendron inerme. Among this crisply clipped interweaving motif are paths and spaces planted with seedlings of C. rosea.

Palm trees extend along the boundary of the garden backed by mountains; on the edge bordered by the corniche is a run of stout, red-flowering bougainvillea.
ÒIt was designed by a municipal engineer and planted five years ago,Ó explains Srinivas, one of the labourers to tend the garden. The knot garden is clipped every 15 to 20 days to keep it neat, he says C. inerme is a fast-growing evergreen, which if left gallops into an exuberant, rambling and wide-spreading bush. Like any garden with topiary, this is fairly high-maintenance horticulture; watering alone lasts for 15 to 30 minutes per day. But the result is pleasing to the human eye and, evidently, to a number of insects, for the grass thrums and whirrs with life.

Secret gardens
In daylight and darkness
Elsewhere in Muscat you can find formal and informal gardens that are worth exploring even when the sun is high some have shade-giving trees or lovely cool pavilions. Adventurous souls even enjoy the gardens after dark, particularly as many of them
border roads with good street lighting. One couple, Beatrice and Rafe, are particularly fond of an elegant public garden in Qurm, which contains immaculately clipped, lollipop-shaped Indian laurels, as well as mature trees and a Jellystone Park-style picnic table. They confess that they only ever visit at night. There is never anyone else here so it feels rather magical and private, says Beatrice, while Rafe admires a glorious scrambler with yolk-coloured flowers that glow in the gloaming. I don't want to visit during the day in case my illusion is shattered.