by Adelani Aderemi

Created on: June 20, 2009   Last Updated: June 23, 2009

In Memory Of My Dear Father

Father was an herbalist, son and grandson of herbalists. An excellent and successful one he was. With his education, he was able to relate well with the creme-de-la-creme including University teachers in African Traditional Religion and in Pharmacy, who had collaborated with him on some University projects. For the purpose of this write up, a herbalist in Africa is a person who treats diseases and sicknesses with a combination of leaves, roots, and barks of plants and other necessary materials.

As a kid, I saw Baba (as we fondly called him) as God. I mean, everything he did was done in the right way and he could never be wrong. A male chauvinist to the core, the respect and fear he commanded in the house and in the neighborhood was instructive to us children. As a man who conversed with the unseen, we always were in awe of him. I must say that I had too much confidence in his ways and knowledge; we knew no hospital treatment in my house until when he started growing old and had to slow down. His wealth and herbal prowess overwhelmed me so much that I grew up with a myopic view of life's challenges and battles. I felt protected and sufficient always. But this caused a lot of disappointment for me as I grew up and faced fiercer challenges of life for which he had no answers.

I focused too much on the spiritual angle to everything. I grew up knowing about good and bad omens and how to attract the good ones while repelling the bad. Often times, I fought omens when I should have been fighting my character flaws. To me every dream had a meaning and purpose, and upon waking up, all my energy would be focused on knowing the meaning of the dream.

Closely related to the dream issue is the practice of divination. This is central to the operation of the herbalist's trade. The herbalist must learn the cause of a patient's troubles by consulting the spirits. The remedies come the same way. The daily schedule of the herbalist is anchored on what the spirits say. Growing up in this environment had its toll on me, as I always tried to learn what was in the future for me. I started consulting the horoscope right from primary school. It was always in the newspapers and magazines.

I must quickly say here that the herbalist could do his work treatment using herbs- without divination or interaction with witches, if only he has faith in God who made the herbs in the first place. Africans believe that diseases or sicknesses could be inflicted by

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