Pears grown in the shape of the Buddha

Mark sez, "Growing pears inside a Buddha-shaped plastic form yields much fruit love!"

Como fazer peras em formato de buda! (Thanks, Mark!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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jaysonlorenzen

Oh man, has anyone here read “Gods of Mars”, 2nd in the John Carter series from Edgar Rice Burroughs? Does this fit the description of evolution of the First Borns from that Tree of Life ? Scary!
Anonymous

“There’s a million dollar idea for someone to run with.”

I want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Penises.
Anonymous

Portuguese translation.

There’s no “big” or important information in it to be true.

The guy from the site just says that this is the stranger “how to do” that he has seen and that the process is quite simple, what we need is to put the plastic “shaper” on the fruit while it’s growing.

In the end he makes a retoric question in which is says that is a bit frigthened of what marketeers can do with this.
hokano

nani mo nashi
phisrow

“You’ll need every bit, and more, of your vaunted ‘serenity’ to stay sane when you are sealed forever inside the buddha capsule…”
sciencemike

I have thought for a long time that the folks at Delware’s famous Punkin Chunkin http://www.punkinchunkin.com/ where they launch pumpkins for distance could use this technology. They should grow their squashes in molds like this to create more aerodynamic and even rifled pumpkins. I am pretty sure the rules would permit it. They already breed pumpkins for less water content so they don’t blow apart upon leaving the canon. This is just the next logical step.
Anonymous

Japan has been making square watermelon (the better to fit in the fridge) this way for years now.
Takuan

Jizo, neh?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ksitigarbha
ChunkyMonkeyBrain

coolest thing I’ve seen all week.
Ito Kagehisa

Sorry, ScienceMike, you pick your punkins from the pile at the chunkin. The ammunition rules are pretty much designed to prevent what you’re talking about; General Rule 4 for example: Pumpkins are not to be altered in any way, excluding P.C.A. marker paints. All pumpkins must be in their natural state.

Back in the day, the guys in the unlimited category with the big air cannons used to dip their pumpkins into liquid nitrogen before firing. I think that practice has since been made illegal, but, I could be wrong.
Anonymous

If you meet the Buddha on the tree, EAT HIM!
Takuan

moral question: is it wrong to eat grave and shrine offerings when one is hungry?
Anonymous

Yes, Taku-san, but it is not wrong to feed them to others who are hungry.
Anonymous

Takuan: I was once at the Temple for a retreat, where there were packages of cookies on the offering alter. When we sat for tea the monk said, “Oh the Buddha has some tea cake.” He got up , bowed to the Buddha & said, ” May I share your tea cakes with my friends”. he turned to us & said, ” he didn’t say anything.” “He wants me to decide”, and we had cookies with our tea. It’s more than ok, it’s the custom that food be consumed in the following day or two after offering. Ariya Nama
madsci

Wait a minute.. I’ve got a CNC milling machine capable of making the molds, and a small vacuum-former, and a stockpile of polycarbonate sheets… I could totally make some of these! What other fruit can I do this with?
unruly katy

The Canadian artist Mary Catherine Newcomb has been doing this for years. Her work is really lovely. http://www.newcombalia.ca
Anonymous

There’s a million dollar idea for someone to run with.
StRevAlex

Comprachicos!
nanuq

It seems like you could grow pears in any shape you want that way. Certain x-rated possibilities come to mind (yeah, like you weren’t thinking that way too).
Junglemonkey

Takuan #5: No, it’s not. Above all else, the Buddha was a pragmatist.
benher

Wow, this is so much simpler than my idea to use a soldering iron to draw Jesus on potato chips… I was hoping to make the cover of MAKE!
fisheggs

A philosophical fruit!
Gelfin

If you meet the Buddha on a tree, eat him.
Anonymous

no, not sacrilicious…. buddhalicious! Where were these grown, anyway… gotta be Japan, right?
Anonymous

I don’t think we should be eating things that GROW IN PLASTIC. Uh…yeah, maybe that’s just me.

–Erin
Anonymous

Why has nobody done this with the virgin mary? Think about it – you could sell virgin mary pears for $10 a pop on ebay! I mean, if grilled cheese sandwich sells, the pear ought to.

On a slightly (but not by much) sleazier track – how about pear Jenna Jamesons or Peter Norths? {Insert crude comment concerning ingestion of either star here}.

And last but not least – the car/cake from Animal House. Truly, the instructions on the car/cake could be followed.
kaiza

Slicing one of these down the middle would make me feel either:

a) uncomfortable

b) like a samurai
toxonix

This is great. My pears get eaten by bugs or birds if they aren’t covered.
buddy66

LOL, Gelfin!
Anonymous

The greatness in Buddhism.
The gift of nature in a pear.
The mediocrity of a Buddha shaped pear fruit.
Yamara

Anyone thinking about the Virgin Mary market for this?
Takuan

interesting link, Strevalex, but oddly it makes no mention of the most obvious:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corset
The Unusual Suspect

Hm. Photoshop?
Takuan

molds of public and political figures would be best sellers.
wylkyn

It’s bad enough you have to rip the tree’s nads off while it’s still alive, but now you’re going to keep them in a vice? Why isn’t PETA going apesh*t about this?

Oh, right…these living things have no rights. Nevermind.
Takuan

http://tinyurl.com/n8d2fu
Takuan

http://www.instructables.com/id/Grow-a-square-watermelon/
jimh

Gate Gate Pear-agate Pear-asamgate bodhi svaha!
Takuan

http://www.leevalley.com/garden/page.aspx?c=1&p=51543&cat=2,2200
Anonymous

@27:Anonymous:

“There’s a million dollar idea for someone to run with.”
“I want to say one word to you. Just one word.”
“Penises.”

Penises? I say Jesus!
Just think of your tree that produces say 100 Jesus shaped pears. You get one at a time, put it in a basket along with normal pears, then go to a fundie town and sell it to the highest bidder, which will nearly always be a preacher or some rich redneck. Next day you just do the same in a different town.
Torley

#5 â€” it’s SO funny you mention that. Related story: a Thai friend told me about “grave robbers”. This of course sounded horrific, so I went on to prod for further details. My friend clarified he didn’t mean they take the corpses, but rather, the food and shrine offerings left on the graves; especially those of wealthy people.

In Thailand, there are many districts in which a wall (perhaps with spikes or broken glass shards embedded to “protect” it) between poor slums and rich people’s houses. Some of these divisions happen near graveyards, and when some of the poor get hungry, if there’s an open entrance which is easier to get into, they may, often at night, seize the opportunity to diminish a given grave’s supply of plantain, mangos, rice bowl (with obligatory chopsticks stuck vertically in it), even cooked whole chicken, and other recently-deposited delicacies.

My Thai grandmother once expressed that leaving food offerings for the dead is a waste unless the living come to eat them. She’s dead now, so I hope the same is being carried out on her tomb.
Brainspore

Sacralicious! I’m gonna eat one with a grilled cheese sandwich bearing the image of the Virgin Mary.
Takuan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JH_aAE7n7yA&feature=related
Takuan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joss_paper
Anonymous

The thing they put it in to make it grow into that shape looks like a medieval torture device! D:
Daemon

If you meet the buddha, eat him.
Anonymous

awesome idea. i’ve seen other forms from lee valley in canada, but the buddha is much more interesting!

http://www.leevalley.com/garden/page.aspx?c=1&cat=2,2200&p=51543
pentomino

For some reason this reminds me of Bonsai Kitten