Nature Heals – Even if we don’t understand how
I should note up front that the information in this article does not constitute medical advice for any ailment. However, if you enjoy my story and want to give it a try, you’re more than welcome.
Sometime last year (2024), when my family and I were still living in Malindi, something happened that changed my mindset about a certain aspect of my lifestyle. I began experiencing an intense pain in my right molar—it was no joke. The toothache was so severe I could feel the tooth itself wobbling at the root.
Initially, I considered seeing a dentist, but when my wife told me how expensive that could be, I dismissed the idea.
Around that same time, I noticed a strange aversion every time I picked up my toothbrush to put on toothpaste. I couldn’t explain it, and I didn’t connect it to the toothache at all. I just knew I started skipping brushing my teeth—and some days I even forgot entirely that I hadn’t brushed.
One particular morning, I walked into the bathroom to brush my teeth and the distaste was more pronounced than ever. Suddenly, I heard an inner voice—or so it seemed—saying, “Why don’t you cut a branch from the neem tree and use it as your chewing stick?” That was all the instruction I needed.
In that instant, I stepped out onto our apartment balcony, where a neem branch was hanging over the railing, and snapped off a piece. Our compound had many mature neem trees. We were on the third floor, so imagine how tall that tree must have been for its branches to reach our balcony.
From that day forward, I used the neem branch as my chewing stick to clean my teeth. If you know the plant, you’ll recognize that neem is extremely bitter—so at first, it was not a pleasant experience, but I eventually got used to it.
It reminded me of my childhood, when neem leaves and bark were common ingredients in home remedies for malaria and flu. If my memory serves, we used neem leaves and bark, mango tree bark, lime, lemongrass, and a few other herbs that I can’t recall right now.
Back then, the older generation told us that neem extract was used in the production of chloroquine, a malaria drug—also known for its intense bitterness, much like neem.
Anyway, I continued using my neem chewing stick, and sometimes I even swallowed the bitter saliva it produced. When we left Malindi, I cut extra sticks and brought them along with me. Even on my recent trip to Uganda, my neem chewing stick was tucked into my travel bag.
Just a few days ago, after several months of using the neem chewing stick, I suddenly realized that the terrible toothache I’d had was completely gone. It was a funny realization: I immediately put my index finger in my mouth to feel the affected molar, but there was no pain and no wobbling—nothing. It seemed the toothache had vanished, healed by the neem tree and the simple instruction to use its branch for brushing.
So, is this medical advice that you should try if you have a toothache? That’s up to you.
Nature heals but nature cannot be rushed
If there is something beautiful that nature can teach anyone humble enough to learn, is that the trees of the earth are for the healing of people of the world and that nature can never be rushed. But unfortunately, we live in a world that believes that modern science is God and that nature must be rushed to deliver its goods to these Human-Gods who call themselves scientists. And when we cannot rush nature, we create a synthetic version of what nature offers and then call it scientific breakthrough. But is that really a breakthrough or we are creating monsters that will come to hunt us later. I will leave that for you to think about.
It’s all about perspective
Over the course of about six years of publishing this magazine, I have had to read, hear or just watch some Africans make a mockery of natural herbal medicine which Africa and many other indigenous peoples of the world are known to us for their health system. Some Africans will tell you over their dead bodies will they put herbal medicine in their mouths. But these same Africans love drinking tea, and coffee to them is a morning ritual that they cannot live without. But tea and coffee are simply herbal medicines that became globally popular because of capitalism. And you might not agree.
That the likes of Starbucks and Java have made coffee their cash-cows, well if it’s actually coffee that they sell, does not stop coffee from being that beautiful herbal medicine that originated from the land of Ethiopia. And same with tea. That tea took a different tangent and became what Africans love to brag about as their cash crop, does not change the fact that tea was one of the crops brought into Africa by Europeans and for which much of our original crops were lost.
So, from both sides of the story of coffee and tea, we need a different perspective to truly see how we Africans take for granted the things that we are blessed with, while others make those same things their money-making machines.
Nature and the herbs found in nature are not demonic. They are a blessing from the Creator to us. We should embrace, use and also enjoy these blessings. It’s our right as Africans and people of the world.
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