Bush magic

Culture Matters

ZEBAPIQUE – good for the cold. Boil the leaves and drink the water, or better yet, soak in some puncheon rum for about a week and then drink, if you could handle it. You could chew a piece of chadon beni too, but what you really want to do is make a tea with ginger, nutmeg and other spices and drop in a bayleaf.

Bush medicine has always been part of my existence. Dried orange peels hung in the kitchen for any time you fancied orange peel tea. Eyes hurting or feeling grainy? Wash them with ditipayee. Or swallow a little aloes every day to make your hair and skin look nice.

I was pretty much indifferent to all of it. In any case, all the boiling, soaking and heating of the various leaves and roots were managed by the adults and elders around me. I considered their rituals “big people thing.”

Of course, it became my business when it was time for “clean out.” I used to wonder “what they really trying to clean out of me and why it have to taste so horrible and hurt so bad?” Naturally, I never asked this out loud, but for a long time bush remedies were quite literally a pain in the rear, with the annual senna and salts drama.

My grandmother’s push-out mouth and unsmilingly face also did not make refusal an option. In fact, she would wait with predator-like patience while I tried different ways to avoid drinking from the cup on the kitchen table. She knew that inevitably she would win that particular battle of wills.

Today she would no doubt shake her head to see me voluntarily drinking bush tea and researching the healing properties of plants and spices. Lately, it has become important to find ways of incorporating the practices of my ancestors into my normal routine. What are the various teas for? How did they cure headaches or treat with difficult menstruation? What is the ratio of spices or bush leaves to water?

Our ancestors would have had little difficulty answering these questions as they reached into their unique healing traditions, whether indigenous, Indian or African. Indeed, some of the herbs and spices that we use now were common in ancient civilisations, including the Egyptian empire which existed some 5,000 years ago.

For instance, cinnamon “...used to be rare and valuable and was regarded as a gift fit for kings.” This particular spice is effective in treating, among others, certain types of diabetic conditions, pain and boosting the immune system.

Nutmeg, another super spice, is reputed for its impact on insomnia, digestion and brain health. It is said that practitioners of Indian Ayurvedic medicine even revered nutmeg for its effectiveness in treating depression.

If you can believe it, by the 15th century a fierce trade in spices occurred between Europe, Asia and northern Africa. It became trendy for wealthy Europeans to include exotic spices not available in Europe into their diets. “At one point in the 1300s...a pound of nutmeg in Europe cost seven fattened oxen and was a more valuable commodity than gold.”

In TT, our forefathers would have settled here with much of this knowledge. For example, Cristo Adonis, the pyai or shaman of the indigenous peoples of Arima, is famed within the community for his in-depth understanding of herbs. However, at a natural healing forum a few years ago, he admitted that much of this information is still locked in the heads of older generations.

As the modern human race slowly grasps the importance of living in harmony with nature, it is essential that we accept the relevance of our ancient practices and reintegrate them into our way of life. Increasingly, this will become less a matter of choice than necessity. This year, TT is ranked 14th out of 191 countries for being unhealthy. We received “poor scores for depression, blood pressure, and blood glucose.” Obesity continues to be a challenge, increasingly for children.

The enslavers and colonials trained us, effectively, to prefer the foods, education styles and even attire of the dominant classes, while scorning traditional beliefs and practices. As we work towards rectifying these errors and building a country that reflects our multicultural origins, incorporating this medicinal heritage into our social structures will be imperative.

So, I will admit, I liked vervine tea; it was gentle and flavourful. But, while I support getting closer to our herbal legacy, if you want to see me run, bring out the senna.

Dara E Healy is a performance artist, communications specialist and founder of the NGO, the Indigenous Creative Arts Network – ICAN

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