Healing & Protection

Public opinion changes like the tides – ebb and flow. The belief in progress of the 20^th century repressed traditional healing in the western world. Today at the beginning of a new century natural medicine is booming, because of the discontent of patients with high tech medicine.. What is the secret of this healing method. Everyone knows  the  healing success is in the herbs and bark of trees.. The lushness and fertility of the tropical rainforest, nothing to compare with in Europe, convinces even the unknowing tourist of the power of these plants. The taste reveals it. Like hot pepper certain bark burn on the tongue or even on the skin.. Substances are taken as tea, cream, inhalation , or mixed with a strong liquor taken by way of mouth,nose, anus and the pores. Only the healers know the properties of the plants that they use as herbs, fresh leaves, bark, roots,onions, fruits and buds. They are crushed, pulverizedor mixed with liquids. A healing ceremony begins early in the morning, and can take all day, sometimes even weeks..The healer sees the plants only as a secondary part of the healing process. They see their healing as holistic. They work on the physical, psychic and social level. A healer explained this complex process in a simple sentence: „My work consists of bringing people back in balance“. 

After putting together a fine collection of "Putchu Guinadji", miniature horsemen or warriors made of bronze, silver, copper, or brass for his museum, Henning Christoph became curious about these talismans that were supposedly used by mad people among the Kotoko people in Cameroon and Chad, near the Lake Chad basin , along the Logone and Chan rivers. This area is where the ancient  kingdom of Sao was located from the 6th to the 16th century.