Pile of Coconuts
The ripe coconut with its hard dry kernel, as it is generally seen in the United States, is quite different from the young nut as it hangs on the tree. Then it contains only a thin layer of soft white meat around the inner part of the shell, the remaining space being filled with a delicious liquid.
Gathering Coconuts
When people are traveling in the Philippines and become thirsty, a man fastens a strap or cord to his feet so that they will be about as far apart as the diameter of the tree, and with this aid in bracing himself, he climbs easily up the long straight trunk to the leafy crown where the nuts hang in clusters. He cuts off and drops to the ground as many nuts as are wanted, and then slides down the tree. With his bolo he strikes a slice from the husk of a nut so deftly that a small hole is opened in the shell and the liquid, cool, sweet, and refreshing, is easily drunk. When the traveler’s thirst is quenched, the nut is split in half, a rude spoon is made from the husk, and the thin layer of soft white meat is scooped from the shell and eaten. By boiling the kernel of the ripe nut an oil is obtained which is used for burning in lamps, for cooking, and for oiling the hair. When the meat of the coconut is dried it is called copra (cō′-prä), and large quantities of this are shipped to foreign countries, where it is used for making candles and soap.
Native Collecting Sap
By tapping the flower, a liquid is secured that is made into a drink called tuba. Each day in the cool early morning, a Filipino, having a bamboo tube slung from his shoulder in place of a bucket, climbs the tree to collect this sap. The flowers can be so tapped for about three months; of course the nuts have to be sacrificed if tuba is wanted, because the flowers die. It is a common sight in a coconut grove to see large bamboo poles reaching from the top of one tree to its nearest neighbor. These are for the use of the one who taps the flowers, so that instead of climbing each separate tree he can pass from one to another by this dizzy bridge and thus secure his tuba with less effort.
