10/11/2007

Sweet Osmanthus

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Sweet Osmanthus

***** Location: Japan
***** Season: Late autumn
***** Category: Plant


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Explanation


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Sweet Osmanthus (Osmanthus fragrans)
Sweet Olive, Tea Olive, Fragrant Olive


golden sweet olive, gold mokusei, kin mokusei
金木犀(きんもくせい)

fragrant olive, mokusei, 木犀 (もくせい)
flower of the mokusei, mokusei no hana
木犀の花(もくせいのはな)

silver mokusei, fragrant white olive, gin mokusei
銀木犀(ぎんもくせい)


light yellow mokusei, usugi mokusei
薄黄木犀(うすぎもくせい)
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The origin of this tree is China, but now it is well loved to give some fragrance to the Japanese garden since the Edo period. The smell reaches far and therefore the flower is sometimes even called " "Smelling for seven (or nine) RI of distance" (七里香, 九里香).
A "Ri" is a little less than 4 kilometers or almost two and a half miles.

Gekkitsu ゲッキツ (月橘): This is also the name of a tree of the citrus group with fragrant blossoms.

The bush has many small branches with many fragrant flowers of various colors, hence the names given above..

Gabi Greve

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The Sweet Osmanthus (Latin name: Osmanthus fragrans; also known as Sweet Olive, Tea Olive and Fragrant Olive) is an evergreen shrub or small tree growing to 5-12 m tall. It is native to Asia, from the Himalaya east through China to Japan.

The leaves are 5-10 cm long, entire or finely toothed. Its flowers, produced through the summer, are small (1 cm long), white, with a four-lobed corolla and have a strong fragrance.

It is cultivated as an ornamental plant in gardens (both in Asia and elsewhere in the world) for its deliciously fragrant flowers which carry the scent of ripe peaches or apricots. There are two very fine examples in the public gardens in Menaggio on the shores of Lake Como in Lombardy, Italy.

The plant is semi- to moderately-hardy and will survive light frost but will not survive a prolonged or hard freeze.
© More in the WIKIPEDIA !

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fragrant white olive


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Worldwide use


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Things found on the way



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HAIKU


秋告げる香りはなってキンモクセ
aki tsugeru kaori hanatte kinmokuse

telling of autumn,
the scent of
kinmokusei


-Saeko Takada、Haiku Village 1998

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Walking to school
I smell a faint
of Kinmokusei


Sachiko Endou, 1996

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Vivo de prisa.
"kinmokusei" avisa
para, respira.

I live hastily
"kinmokusei" says
stop, breathe.


Ana Acosta, Mexico 2001



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Related words

***** oobai 黄梅 (おうばい) "yellow plum". Winter Jasmine
geishunka, geishun ka 迎春花(げいしゅんか)
flower to welcome spring
Jasminum nudiflorum
kigo for early spring


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