Over the past few weeks I've been struggling to beat a head cold that just won't go away. Because of that I've been going everywhere with my box of tissues. Today when I went to blow my nose, Isaac and Esther told me to stop using tissues because it will make me more sick! They said there are lots of small particles in the tissues that get into your nose and make things worse. They recommended I should switch immediately to using a handkerchief, preferably a damp one. Do you think tissues make you more sick? Maybe....
This prompted me to think about other Maasai medical/hygiene approaches. Here's a few of interest:
Maasai have excellent dental hygiene- they use a particular tree branch as a toothbrush and can regularly be found brushing away for shiny white teeth
The solution for all things sickness is to drink 'eilata' or cooking fat. When you need to take medicine, in particular traditional herbs, you take the meds, not with water, but with fat.
Growing up I always remember eating chicken soup and saltines and drinking juice with ginger ale whenever I was sick. We all have those 'sick foods' we'd always have. Here, other than fat of course, everyone eats 'oloshoro' or porridge. It's basically water and sorghum flour mixed with a little sugar heated to taste. It tastes pretty good. But, it's so thick, that I have spent half an hour drinking to only finish off barely a centimeter off the top of my cup!
In the US we often find ourselves looking for the new miracle health foods and diet regimes to lose weight and shrink our stomaches. Here it's the opposite. Maasai have a special concoction of herbs and animal fat boiled together for the purpose of expanding your stomach to make room for more meat. From personal experience, I think it makes more room by forcing you to clear out all things previously located in your stomach...
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
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