*Brace yourself, long post ahead! 😄
Had a date with a friend of mine at a local flower exhibition last Friday. It was an impromptu one as my friend randomly asked me on a Thursday evening if I was interested to go. She got carried away halfway through the message and only manage to reply to my message at 2 am. 😂 Friday was the only available day left for us and we decided to go on Friday morning itself.
According to my friend, Royal Floria Putrajaya is a yearly flower and garden exhibition (this is their 13th year!), but it was put on hold for the past 2 years due to the pandemic. This event was initially held from 29 August - 4 September with RM15 (USD 3+) per entry for adults. I wasn't aware of this event in the past years, so I'm glad I managed to visit for the first time this year!
I later found that the event got extended to 11 September due to the school holidays and it became a free entry now. 🤦♀️
This is the location map of the event. Quite a huge area to cover actually!
The first picture in the morning! Before all the sweat begins... 😂
Was greeted by this beautiful sight at the Royal Pavilion section. They have a beautiful fountain surrounded by a bed of flowers. I guess this is a glimpse of what a garden looks like in a royal palace.
Laman Astaka Diraja means Royal Pavilion Garden in Malay.
They even have a flower-flourishing gazebo! A high gazebo like this is very rare in Malaysia.
Pink flowers as the decoration for the gazebo.
We continued walking to another section, which I believe is the PPJ Garden according to the map (PPJ stands for Perbadanan Putrajaya, which means Putrajaya Corporation in English).
We walked towards the arch and bridge to see where it leads us to.
As you can see from the photo, the place was filled with human beings (as expected). Everyone was busy taking photos of the scenery. Some helped their family and friends to take photos, some did selfie shots. It is quite difficult to get a clean portrait shot with a nice background without humans in it. 😂
This is what it looks like from the top of the bridge.
There's a mini garden and pond with koi fishes below the bridge.
Another angle of the gazebo from the bridge.
I told my friend that she can forget to bring everything, but she MUST remember to bring an umbrella and water because I know it will be a scorching hot day and I don't want her to fall sick. And truly it was! We were already sweating like mad in the first half hour. Thank God for umbrella and water! 😆
We then walked through a lane with many beautiful flower arches and flower trails on both sides. I waited quite a while for the people to get dismissed in order to get this slightly cleaner shot. 😜
Some yellow flowers as I looked up to the arch. :)
As we walked further, we saw this cute building on our left named Lake Cabin. Like it's name, it looks like a little cabin that appeared near the lake or out of nowhere in the forest. They even got a kombi van as their props, as if there's an owner that owns this cabin. Haha so cute!
They even got a kombi van as their props. So cute!
We came to another section called Taman Keluarga Malaysia, which means Family Garden Malaysia in English.
Orchids are one of the main flowers used in this exhibition.
A GIANT red ant! So creative that they used metal steel as their legs!
There are giant bee figurines in the middle of the garden as well!
Aside from displaying the flowers on the ground, they also have this octagon igloo-like structure where they hung various plants and flowers on the wall as decorations. Very creative!
Inside the igloo-like structure, there's a man-made waterfall.
Here's my friend sheltering herself with her umbrella on a garden egg chair. 😂
As we continue to walk, we came across this colourful lantern-like hanging bulbs.
Took a closer look and realised it was actually plants wrapped by colourful jute twine cords (something like burlap strings). Another creative way to display the plants!
China-Malaysia Friendship Garden
We then proceed to another area, which is called the China-Malaysia Friendship Garden. This is quite a unique place as it has a different design theme from the previous areas.
A thoughtfully built garden I would say. It captured a few important elements of what an oriental garden in China would usually have.
This Lingnan-styled Friendship Garden was built in 2014 to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Malaysia.
With the oriental architecture, red lanterns, bonsai and bamboo trees, it really makes you feel like you're in China. 😄
Here's the view from the garden with the Putrajaya Seri Saujana bridge in the background.
Fantasy Garden
The other corner of the area is a place called Fantasy Garden. It looks like an imaginative garden, where they have big figurines like mushrooms, flowers, ladybirds and Christmas candy sticks.
Looks like some fantasy garden that'll appear in movies like The Hobbit/Snow White/Alice in the Wonderland/Super Mario to me. 🍄
Floral Pavillion
We then walked past the Floral Pavillion area, which is an air-conditioned indoor space for floral displays by international and local exhibitors and sponsored by several foreign embassies showcasing the flowers of their respective countries. We quickly ran in as we desperately needed the aircon!!!! 😂
Ahhhh~ our bodies are immediately cool down the moment we stepped in to this place. 😄
There are orchids everywhere! Pink, red, purple, white.....
I guess they're displaying the orchids this way, so that you can imagine how orchids will look like at your home garden, and then proceed to buy the orchids from them after this. 😂
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Floral Displays by International, Local Exhibitors and Foreign Embassies
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Terratrium Display
There is also a Terrarium display from the local Terratrium competition. I shall let Mr Wikipedia explain what a Terrarium is since they can do a better job than me. 😄
A terrarium is usually a sealable glass container containing soil and plants and can be opened for maintenance to access the plants inside. Closed terraria create a unique environment for plant growth, as the transparent walls allow for both heat and light to enter the terrarium. (Wikipedia)
The sealed container combined with the heat entering the terrarium allows for the creation of a small-scale water cycle. This happens because the moisture from both the soil and plants evaporates in the elevated temperatures inside the terrarium. This water vapour then condenses on the walls of the container and eventually falls back to the plants and soil below. (Wikipedia)
Terraria are often kept as decorative or ornamental items.
Mr.David Latimer has built a sealed terrarium in 1960 and the plant has managed to sustain itself for almost 50 years without him opening the bottle to water it. It has since become the world's oldest sealed terrarium. Interesting!
Time For Some Flower Bed Shots! 🌺
This was taken right outside of the indoor exhibition area.
Hey, there you are! ❤️ Hello sunshine! 🌻
Finally It's Lunch Time!
After a 2-hour walk, we finally felt hungry and headed towards the food stalls and food trucks area.
We got ourselves 2 personal-sized pizzas as our lunch!
Chicken Pepperoni and Aloha Chicken.😋
We sat under a tree and have a mini picnic. Had a quick catch-up about our lives there and then too. :)
After our lunch, we walked to the nearby lake.
As the administrative capital of Malaysia, Putrajaya is home to all government departments. See the buildings behind the bridge? Those are mostly government buildings.
Me and my friend were figuring out how to take a selfie with a full bridge behind while holding the umbrella cause the sunlight was just too glaring!
In the end, we just threw the umbrella away and took one quick shot with our small eyes hahaha 😂
Lastly, we came to this covered area where the Malaysian-flag-coloured cloths were hung up in the air.
Red, white, blue and yellow are the colours of the Malaysia flag. 🇲🇾 We just had our national day recently on 31 August!
While we are under these colourful cloths, my friend suggested using the panoramic camera effect to take a selfie. Here are some failed yet funny candid shots while we were testing out. I laughed so much when I looked back at these photos. 😂
Yes, we threw our umbrellas on the floor like it's not ours and take as many pics as we want here. I guess we were just too tired to keep our umbrellas every time we take a photo. 😂
After a few tries, we gave up and decided to just take a normal one. Haha! 😆
Aside from the colourful cloths above us, there are also plenty of floral-themed murals on both sides of this area.
There are also some meaningful human theme murals.
The multi-race and ethnics in Malaysia, are made up of Malay, Chinese, Indian, and the minority ethnic groups from east Malaysia such as the Dayak, Kadazan, and Iban.
Our main frontliners during the pandemic - the doctors and nurses from the medical line. So grateful for each one of them! 🙏
Other front liners who also helped maintain the order in the city and took care of our safety and needs - the polices, armies, postmen and food delivery drivers. Thank you so much! 🙌
Daily view of the Putrajaya garden, where people breeze walking and spending time together with family and friends.
So yes, that calls an end to our trip to Royal Floria Putrajaya. We were so exhausted yet happy to meet each other after a long time. Treasure the time spent with this friend of mine. :)
If you manage to read thus far, thank you for patiently reading this image-heavy post. I took many photos and would love to share what I saw and experienced. Hence I spent hours organising and editing the images cause it's either over or under-exposure to the sunlight. May you enjoy the scenery as much as I do! 😊