Key Points

• Mary Joy Paladin was once an accountant at an international company in the Philippines, but she fulfilled her dream of caring for her family in Australia. Her love for gardening, inherited from her father in Isabela, has become part of her daily life.
• Meanwhile, Emely Barbato not only leads Filipino community events in Newman but also grows vegetables in her backyard to cope with the high prices in their remote mining town in Western Australia.
• They often use seeds from kitchen vegetables for replanting and recycle containers like plastic tubs and styrofoam as pots—making gardening both practical and sustainable.