A rare, stinky event is happening -- again!
       A gigantic plant, "Amorphophallus Titanum" ( commonly known as "Titan Arum" ), was blooming recent days in the United States Botanic Garden in Washington DC !
       This plant, one of the biggest flowers in the World, blossoms one time in a few years, and its blooming lasts only a couple of days. When blossoming, it spreads the odour of decaying fish ( good smell to attract a lot of insects in the nature ).
       Last time the plant blossomed in 2003. This year 2005 the Titan Arum began opening late Saturday night Nov 19th and began to slowly close on Monday Nov 21st.
       Unfortunately, I knew about this event on Monday afternoon only. I rushed to the Botanic Garden, spent about 40 minutes in the line under the cool rain, then about one hours inside the building, and eventually I saw it.
       To my regret, the plant was already fading in this moment, however still in rather good shape. I expected to feel this dead fish odour, but may be because of the fading processes that already started all the small was gone. Nevertheless, the Conservatory employee picked for us a tiny piece of the leaf and let us to sniff it closely. Yes, it really smelled exactly as a dead fish !