Regions: North-East India

A tiny creeping mat for the wet edge of a tub — the softest possible ground cover.

The wild ancestor of cultivated rice, still standing in eastern wetlands.

Half the country’s calories — and a bucket of it on a terrace teaches more than any book.

Pale crisp fruit that smells of rose water, on a small spreading evergreen.

The slender betel-nut palm of the wet coasts, grown in dense shaded gardens.

A climbing orchid that must be hand-pollinated flower by flower, at dawn.

The bamboo that covers Mizoram, and whose mass flowering brings the rat floods.

The deep red night-flowering lily of eastern tanks and temple ponds.

Grows on water or wet mud and crops every fortnight through the monsoon.

A peppery salad green for a shady tray of running or frequently changed water.