Apple - the fruit from heaven

A for apple, B for ball, C for cat... You must have learned the English alphabet this way, identifying the picture and saying the name of the letter. Other simple words with fewer letters begin with a, like ass, axe and arm, but it is always the apple that is used in a picture alphabet. I suppose it is because children know the apple; they have seen it, eaten it and can recognize it at once.

Apple is said to be the most widely cultivated fruit and it is the best known fruit the world over. The largest producers of apples are America, China, Australia, France, Italy, and Turkey.

Some apples are red, some green, some yellow and some a mixture of red and yellow. By cross-breeding, that is by taking the pollen of a flower of one tree and putting it on the flower of another tree, people have developed new varieties of apples.

USA and Canada have developed an apple with a tough skin and this apple keeps fresh for long. These apples are grown for export. Australia has also developed an apple that can be kept a long time. Granny Smith is a popular variety grown in Australia. Golden Delicious is the name of another variety developed in America. See box for the story of the origin of this variety. When you next buy apples, see if there is a label giving the name of the variety, such as Golden Delicious or Cox's Orange Pippins or the country it was grown in.

The hundreds of varieties of apples can be divided into three classes: dessert apples, those eaten raw, the kind on sale on pavements; cooking apples; which are better cooked such as in apple pie and stewed apples; and cider apples, used for making a fermented drink with the juice. These apples are also used for making vinegar.

There are many stories and anecdotes about apples. Sir Isaac Newton discovered the law of gravity by watching a falling apple. Apples being such a popular fruit in England, it often comes up in phrases, similes and sayings used in every day conversation. Most of you, I guess, are familiar with the saying an apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Do you know what is meant by the apple of one's eye? The phrase is used especially with reference to a child. "She is the apple of her father's eye." It means someone loved more than any other, someone very precious and cherished. Originally, apple meant the pupil of the eye. To upset the apple cart is to spoil some one's plans. When something is put in perfect order, it is said to be in apple pie order. An apple-faced child is one with chubby, rosy cheeks. A bad apple or a rotten apple is a corrupt person in a group likely to have a bad influence on others.

Do you know the Adam's apple? It is that part jutting out in the throats of men, very prominent in some, that moves when they are swallowing. It is said that Eve tried to tempt Adam with an apple in the Garden of Eden. The apple got stuck in Adam's throat, and it is that which moves when swallowing; hence it is called Adam's apple.

Using metaphors to indicate the shades of a colour is common to all languages. In Sinhala, "giraa nila" (parrot green) is the colour of paddy at a particular stage of its growth. I've seen something advertised - I cannot remember what - as being apple-white. Then there is apple green, a yellowish green.

"Poma dare Alcinnoo" is a Latin idiom which, translated into English, is 'Give Alicinous an apple. It means useless, like carrying coals to Newcastle, or as we say in Sinhala sending coconuts to Marawila, ('maravilata pol patavanava.') There's no point in giving Alicinous apples because he owned an apple orchard. Alcinous was a character in folklore, like our Andere.

You and I have eaten apples and we know their taste. They are not too big to hold in one's hand. What is the Big Apple that some are talking about? Recently, I read an advertisement in a newspaper which said, "Come, Taste the Big Apple. What is this Big Apple readers are invited to taste? Can you guess?

The Big Apple is New York - the biggest city in America. Why New York is called the Big Apple, I do not know. If you find out, do let me know.

-Sumana Saparamadu.