March 2019

Has anyone tasted Nectar??  where can you find the nectar? The real nectar is honey, says ancient Greek mythology. Honey reassembled nectar believed to have unimaginable powers, also as a source of wisdom and poetry. Honey is also the truth, and it is one product that needs no processing and is made of natural flowers. The color, flavor, and aroma of honey depend on the flowers the bees visit. In Provence, France we find the most unusual acacia honey, which is very sweet, liquidy and pale golden in color and has intoxicating aroma due to lavender. In ancient Rome, there used to be ivory honey with a special flavor due to rosemary. Then there was the Greek honey of Mount Hymettus, which was the favorite of the gods.

The golden-hued honey also has a very important place in the Indian tradition it is used as one of the sacred ingredients for performing Abhishek. The Atharva Veda glorifies honey having the ability to boost Confidence and able people to speak strong. The Romans offer sacrifices of honey to appease pluto the god of the underworld. so that he would not appear in the form of a fiery serpent or as volcanic lava. Honey is certainly mysterious, especially in Greek history and mythology.

In the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, it is mentioned, that the gods of Olympus lived on honey (nectar) and honey wine (ambrosia). In Greek the word “nectar” means “victory over death” and Ambrosia stands for “immortality”.

Aphrodite, The Greek goddess of beauty used honey and beeswax to enhance her beauty. In the ancient world, honey was the first food and has a very special place in Greek mythology.

According to a legend, Rhea mother of God Zeus hid him, in a sacred cavern, on mount lycaeus. a place of immortality, where time did not exist and this sacred place was guarded by fiery bees. Here young Zeus was nursed by Amalthea and Melissa who are daughters of king Melissus. Amalthea and Melissa took great care of Zeus. Amalthea fed Zeus with her goat’s milk and Melissa fed Zeus with honey, Mellisa means she who makes honey. Honey gave the baby Zeus lot of strength, wisdom, and power.

Honey was also forbidden for human consumption those days. Once four armored intruders came in the cavern to steal honey, as they came to baby Zeus started to cry, his cry was thunderous which made the intruders drop their weapons. Giving opportunity to the bees to attack. It was belived that no one could die in the cave particularly after touching honey. So Zeus being merciful turned these intruders to birds and save them from bees fury.

In one more Greek legend, it was said that during the Golden Age, honey ran from the oak trees and the Titan Kronos was sleeping, intoxicated with honey, he had the first sleep in the world. Taking advantage of this situation, his son Zeus chained him and took him away to the Islands of the Blest at the end of the world. The place is still said to have Kronos and the Age of Gold present.

Another legend says that honey was a gift of the god of wine, Dionysus. While he was returning from his expedition on his way back, he was playing with his attendant satyrs, who struck their sistra, a musical instrument to mark time. As the instrument played a swarm of incest’s flew out of the woods, Dionysus guided everyone to a tree and shut themselves up in it, and filled with honey. This legends also iterates the creation of honey.

The Round coconut often represents a human head, the round markings often called eye to represent two eyes and one mouth. There is an interesting folk story from Kerala, that explains the origin of coconut tree came to be, and how the coconut got its face.

In one of the coastal villages lived a young fisherman who was unable to catch any fishes. He used to spend hours trying but missed every catch. The young man became poorer day by day, he also had nothing to eat. He became a laughing stock of the village. This filled the fisherman with remorse and he decided to do something about it.

So, he went to a famous magician who taught him how to remove his head from his body. Soon the young man started going to the beach late in the evenings when all the other fishermen had returned to their homes with their daily catch. Then he would hide behind some rocks, take his head off from his body, and dive into the water. The fish, amazed at the sight of a headless man floating in the sea, would swarm around him curiously. Some of them would enter the man’s body through his neck. The man would then swim ashore, take the fish out, and replace his head. Then he would proudly go back to his village and flaunt his catch.

After a few days, the villagers began to wonder how the young man was able to catch so many fish every day without using fishing nets or rods.

One day, a curious little boy followed him to the beach and watched as he pulled off his head and dived into the water. The little boy quickly ran forward, picked up the man’s head, and threw it into a bush. When the man came out of the water, he could not find his head.

He searched for it frantically, but could not find it. Then, because his magic was running out, he threw himself back into the sea, and became a fish.

The curious little boy brought all the villagers to the beach show them the man’s amazing head. But when they got to the bush where he had thrown the man’s head, they found that it had already grown into a tall and slender palm with nuts on it.

Each nut had the man’s face on it. And, that is how the coconut tree was created.