Coconut Culture Day
The coconut palm is the national tree of the Maldives, appearing on the coat of arms, the currency, and the national flag (which features a coconut palm in the green rectangle). Every part of the coconut tree is used: the trunk for building dhonis and houses, the fronds for thatching roofs and weaving baskets, the coir for rope-making, the husk for fuel, the milk for cooking, the oil for lamps and skin, the shell for cups and utensils, and the heart (the "millionaire's cabbage") for ceremonial dishes. The Maldives has a rich vocabulary for coconut: "gabulhi" (young green coconut for drinking), "kaashi" (mature coconut with hard shell), "miri" (soft coconut meat), "thel" (coconut oil), "ruh" (the tree itself), and "ebudhoshi" (coconut flower bud used for sweet sap called "raa," which is fermented into toddy). The toddy tappers ("raa veriyaa") climb the palms at dawn and dusk, cutting the flower buds and collecting the sweet sap in coconut shell cups : a practice unchanged for millennia. Coconut sap is also boiled into coconut syrup ("hiyaa") and coconut sugar ("hakuru"), the latter being an essential ingredient in Maldivian sweets. The coconut is not just a crop in the Maldives : it is the material foundation of the civilization, and a Maldivian proverb says: "A coconut tree is a mother; it feeds you before you are born and after you are dead."
