“Gardening is an activity that relaxes you and calms you down, it puts your patience to work,” she says. Juan Micelliwho is part of the staff of The hotel of the famous, in this second season of El Trece. The role of him in reality-that from Monday it takes place at 18.30– It is ideal for lowering the decibels of many of the participants, involving them with activities in the garden.

After thirty years dedicated to journalism, from the screens of ElTrece, TN and Public TV, in 2019 he decides to swerve and change sides. His studies as an agricultural expert were the starting point for turn to the world of botany, landscaping and gardening.

If last year Miceli gave reality players his knowledge on how to prune, water, take care of plants to keep the hotel grounds in good condition, This year the focus will be on small jobs: how to build a pond, a compost bin, an orchard, a vertical garden or how to grow native plants in the garden surrounding the hotel.

“The move is quite didactic and I learned a little together with the participants. I realized that everyone who went down two gears during that time of connectedness to nature, sedated themselves,” she says. “Being With Plants Clears Your Mind”sentence from his experience.

A student of the green universe

In accordance with this idea, Miceli delved into the topic and last year she took a horticulture course with the Peruvian biologist Daniela Rodríguez Silvawhich is an international landmark.

“Apply different gardening activities to different health situations, such as addictions, depression, eating disorders, among others, as a complement to medical care,” she says.

Enthusiastic about the therapy, Miceli assures: “The result is spectacular. And everything I’m learning has led me to want to spread it, so I accepted to be able to The hotel of the famous. It’s a way to make it known in an open television space,” she says.

With a clear objective, he assures: “If someone, among the participants or the public, after seeing the program wants to go to a nursery or to connect more with plants, I’m done”. And appealing to the botanical metaphor, he says: “The seed is planted”.

From the old journalistic activity, linked to schedules and strongly conditioned by information (“which enslaves you”, he points out), something good was left: “Every subject of botany that I discover I investigate, I analyze, I think about it to find out why this or that plant is called what’s its name, for example. And so with everything.”

Miceli likes to find out even the smallest detail of new topics she encounters.” For example, the strelitzia reginae, Commonly called bird flower or bird of paradise, it is named after the German Duchess Sophie Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, who was Queen of England when she married King George III and an avant-garde woman.

In the name of plants

Juan also refers to one of the species currently in vogue, succulents, from which he also traced the origin of its name. “Among succulents, also called crassulaceae, there are those that are cacti, native to America, and not cacti, whose origin is in Africa and other parts of the world,” he describes: “They adapt to adverse conditions, aim for everything”.

But going a little deeper, he explains: “The question of crassulácea comes from a Roman general named Marcus Crassus, who lost an important battle. From there comes the word ‘gross error’ (Crassus error) as the equivalent of coarse. These plants are robust, or the equivalent, succulents.’

But if we talk about plants that are in vogue, this becomes more evident with flowers. “There used to be carnations in every house. Now you hardly see them. Something similar happens with hollyhocks and geraniums, even if they are once again the center of attention“, account. “Especially in England, for example, where gardening has a strong tradition, almost like football”.

For those who, like Miceli, discover the plant world from a new perspective, a universe of immense wealth opens up, in many respects, almost philosophical. In this sense, Miceli he recommends several things to dig deeper into the subject.

One is the documentary made by the BBC, in 1979, The secret life of plantswith music by Stevie Wonder, which shows, from a surprising perspective, the pain and pleasure that plants feel and how they communicate it. And also the books and videos of the Italian botanist Stephen Mancusowhich investigates the subject from a fascinating point of view.

“Plants are the only living things that produce their own food.. The rest of us eat plants or eat animals that ate plants,” he describes. And he recalls the large number of botanists who, throughout history, have traveled the world, looking for new plants and discovering rare species.

“There are very crazy stories, like those of Alexander von Humboldt, which also serve to tell wonderful stories through plants,” he says. Some of all that wonderful The green world is also reflected in the language, from which dozens of metaphors emerge..

“The idea of ​​sowing or planting a seed as a way to excite or generate interest, or the concept that planting it will pay off if it’s in the right place, is perfectly applicable to people too,” he says: “Anyone can function better if it’s in the right place.” right place”.

From chef Christian Petersen, another of the specialists who participate in the reality show they host Carolina Pampita Ardohain and Chino LeunisMiceli was able to contact the producers of the Más Chic cable signal, from where they proposed to do a gardening program.

“The series will be called Jardines para disfrutar and will be broadcast in March for that sign I have recorded 12 programs and in each one you will see how two spaces come together”, he says. “Everything is to become aware of what green life is”, says Miceli who, from his Instagram account, @viva_latierra, keeps his old job as a journalist, disseminating information on these topics.