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On this World Homeopathy Day, we all celebrating Madagascar's best treasures, which are our sacred healing plants. At MadaLiving, we believe in both traditional healing and modern medicine. Modern medicine comes from traditional healing practices so both can be able to coexist in this modern world. Madagascar is famous for her healing plants such as the ravintsara plant, “Raokandro”: the Traditional Malagasy Medicine
Disclaimer: the content of this article is purely and uniquely for information. If you are sick, which is not our wish, please seek the help of a health professional (that is: a doctor in the Western medicine or a practitioner specialist in the raokandro Malagasy). The information we provide is not to diagnose or provide any cures for ailments.
In Malagasy, there is the saying: “sery vitan’anamalaho, tsy hamonoana vatotr’akoho” which translates to do not kill a chicken to treat a cold you can heal with a ‘warm herb’). In the large sense, this proverb is intended to tell people to not complicate things and solve a problem with the appropriate solution, do not waste resources and energy for a simple matter. In the strict sense, it shows an example of the Malagasy traditional medicine. Indeed, when someone catches a cold, the Malagasy will make a drink or a soup out of a warm herb called “anamalaho” which is very similar to the cress of para. Only when the cold gets worse will the Malagasy would make a chicken soup with ginger to treat the fever and strengthen the ill person. Just like the Chinese Traditional Medicine, the Malagasy have a multitude of natural formulas to treat almost every disease.
The “Ntaolo” (the ancient Malagasy) have long observed nature that they came up with some amazing treatments which sometimes look completely irrational or even absurd, but somehow you would find that it simply follows the law of the nature. For example, if they want to use the above-the-ground part of a plant, they will do the harvest during the ascending moon because this is where all the nutrients are in the plant, but if they want to use the roots (ginger, cassava, etc.), they will dig it during the descending moon because the nutrients will be underground during that period. Some rules of the raokandro which we would qualify as incomprehensible are leaves that were collected on Mondays, trunks were cut on Tuesdays, and the bark on Wednesdays; fruits were harvested on Thursdays, flowers were collected on Fridays, roots were dug on Saturdays, and the whole plant can be taken on Sundays. In many usually, the raokandro makes a drink called “tambavy” out of a plant or a combination of several plants. It consists of boiling leaves, roots, barks, or trunks and the “water” that is left of it.
When Europeans came to colonize Madagascar, they brought and imposed their medicine and so they qualified the traditional Malagasy medicine as witchcraft. Ever since, when someone is called “mpanao ody” or “mpilalao ody”, he or she is supposedly a sorcerer, but originally “mpanao ody” (mpanao= fabricant, preparer ; ody or fanafody = medicine) is the person who makes and prepares the medicine.
While the colonizers qualified the local medicine which uses the nature to treat diseases as witchcraft, it is known that in the 25 years prior to 2007, 70% of new drugs introduced in the US were from mother nature 70% of new drugs come from Mother Nature (mongabay.com) and today, there are over 100 active ingredients of drugs and medicines that are derived from plants Drugs and Medicine Made From Plants (thoughtco.com)
Would you treat a hemorrhoid with a surgery or with one cashew nut in your pocket?
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