I have a cold again; I woke up feeling tired and with a tickle in my throat and then it hit me like a truck this afternoon. I was in a meeting at NCA and so on the way home I stopped at Hafiz Juice Corner, one of my favorite spots along the Lahore Mall, and had some fresh grapefruit juice for the vitamin C. But a three hour nap later I still feel exhausted and scratchy-throated, so it's time to bust out the joshanda again.
I'm fascinated with joshanda. When I had a cold a few months ago (not long after arriving) Shahzad suggested I try it and I found it to be very soothing and helpful. It's an herbal preparation that was developed in Unani medicine (traditional Graeco-Arabic medicine, traced back through Avicenna, Galen, and Hippocrates). It comes as small brown crystals in little foil packets which you dissolve in hot water. And it is delicious!
The ingredients on the package are listed as:
It seems that different companies use different combinations of herbs in their preparations, although this seems to be a pretty general recipe. Traditionally joshanda is made by boiling the herbs down, but now it comes in these convenient little sachets like instant coffee.
David Arnold argues that "modernity is not a single entity, patented by the West and and retailed across the globe, but is capable of multiple forms and any number of cultural and political variants which, while inevitable drawing on the science, technology, and medicine of the West, also incorporate indigenous traditions and local systems of knowledge, thus enabling a country like India [or, obviously, Pakistan] to forge a modern identity appropriate to its own cultural legacies and specific needs." (2000:17) A fairly recent pharmaceutical study in the Pakistan Journal of Pharmacology (Azmi et al. 2010) found significant antimicrobial activity in certain ingredients commonly used in joshanda, thus legitimizing indigenous medicine through Western-style scientific techniques. The joshanda packet (by which I mean its formal qualities; mass-produced, sterile, printed in Urdu and English, etc.), and the discourses around joshanda (see this article in Time, or this article in Dawn, for example) provide a small but interesting example of embracing the symbolic value of traditional medicine while at the same time adopting certain trappings of the modern Western medico-industrial complex.
In other news, I repotted my small basil plants, my vines grow bigger every day, and my zinnia is blooming!
REFERENCES
Arnold, David
2000 Science, Technology, and Medicine in Colonial India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Azmi, Abdul Azim et al.
2010 Antibacterial Activity of Joshanda: A Polyherbal Therapeutic Agent Used in Common Cold. Pakistan Journal of Pharmacology 27(1):25-28.
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| I wanted pomegranate but they were out. :( |
I'm fascinated with joshanda. When I had a cold a few months ago (not long after arriving) Shahzad suggested I try it and I found it to be very soothing and helpful. It's an herbal preparation that was developed in Unani medicine (traditional Graeco-Arabic medicine, traced back through Avicenna, Galen, and Hippocrates). It comes as small brown crystals in little foil packets which you dissolve in hot water. And it is delicious!
The ingredients on the package are listed as:
- Malabar nut tree leaves (Barg-baansa, Adhatoda vasica)
- Licorice root (Mulethi, Glycyrrhiza glabra)
- Hyssop (Zufa, Hyssopus officinalis)
- Licorice extract (Rubb-us-sus)
- Ephedra (Soma kalpa, Ephedra gerardiana)
- Poppy seeds (Khushkhaash, Papaver somniferum)
It seems that different companies use different combinations of herbs in their preparations, although this seems to be a pretty general recipe. Traditionally joshanda is made by boiling the herbs down, but now it comes in these convenient little sachets like instant coffee.
David Arnold argues that "modernity is not a single entity, patented by the West and and retailed across the globe, but is capable of multiple forms and any number of cultural and political variants which, while inevitable drawing on the science, technology, and medicine of the West, also incorporate indigenous traditions and local systems of knowledge, thus enabling a country like India [or, obviously, Pakistan] to forge a modern identity appropriate to its own cultural legacies and specific needs." (2000:17) A fairly recent pharmaceutical study in the Pakistan Journal of Pharmacology (Azmi et al. 2010) found significant antimicrobial activity in certain ingredients commonly used in joshanda, thus legitimizing indigenous medicine through Western-style scientific techniques. The joshanda packet (by which I mean its formal qualities; mass-produced, sterile, printed in Urdu and English, etc.), and the discourses around joshanda (see this article in Time, or this article in Dawn, for example) provide a small but interesting example of embracing the symbolic value of traditional medicine while at the same time adopting certain trappings of the modern Western medico-industrial complex.
In other news, I repotted my small basil plants, my vines grow bigger every day, and my zinnia is blooming!
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| Tiny tiny basil plants |
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| Zinnia |
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| The bitter melon vines have made it all the way to the top of the railing. |
REFERENCES
Arnold, David
2000 Science, Technology, and Medicine in Colonial India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Azmi, Abdul Azim et al.
2010 Antibacterial Activity of Joshanda: A Polyherbal Therapeutic Agent Used in Common Cold. Pakistan Journal of Pharmacology 27(1):25-28.
The Snake plant purifies air by absorbing toxins through the leaves and producing pure oxygen.Plants suitable for karachi In fact, the Sansevieria is an ideal bedroom plant. Whereas most other plants release carbon dioxide at night (in the absence of photosynthesis), the Sansevieria continues to produce oxygen.
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