Published on The Brunei Times
A garden of herbal remedies
Liz Price
KUALA LUMPUR
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
ICOULDN'T believe the number of different species of plants that were neatly arranged in pots in the garden. They were all labelled, and the plants looked well cared for. It takes Dr Abdul Ghani Hussain more than an hour each day to water all his green babies in this open air nursery.
Dr Ghani came out to meet us with a big smile on his face, and introduce us to his "herb walk in my garden". Having lived on the island of Langkawi for more than 20 years, and having a deep interest in the medicinal value of plants, he has collected more than 500 species of plants that are used in traditional Malay medicine. And now he shares his knowledge with anyone who is interested. He runs different herbwalks, the one I had chosen was in his garden, but he also does a longer walk in the rainforest and an ethnobotanical tour in the mangroves.
The garden tour can take two hours, with Dr Ghani explaining the plants. He will show you the plants which local people have been using for years to treat common ailments. You can see everything from common weeds to exotic plants, which are used for many things from simple fever to more complex sexual dysfunction.
Dr Ghani is a qualified medical practitioner who spent his working life practising western style medicine. But during this time he has been looking at the medicinal value of plants. His research was spurred by the fact that his wife suffered from allergies to modern medicine, and eventually he found a common local weed that could help his wife. From then he never looked back, and began to delve deeper into the rainforests and mangroves on Langkawi.
Traditional Malay medicine is one of the oldest forms of healing, encompassing the use of plants, minerals and animal products as medicine. Malaysia is one of the most diverse areas in the world in terms of biodiversity, having a huge range of natural resources growing in the wild. Now many of these plants are growing in this amazing garden in Langkawi and are available for people to see.
You can find out what value plants have hidden in their leaves, stems, roots, bark, fruit and seeds. One of the most famous traditional plants is Tongkat Ali, which is a species of Eurycoma, but not many people know what it looks like. Ginger or kunyit is another well known remedy, both in Asian and Western traditional remedies, and here you can see a variety of different gingers.
The city of Ipoh in Perak is named after the Ipoh tree. The sap from this tree is used by the orang asli as a poison for their blow darts. The latex is present in the bark and foliage and Dr Ghani, having made sure his small son was out of harm's way, carefully pulled off a leaf and we could see the white sap oozing out.
I was particularly excited to see a couple of Cycas in pots. Cycas is a genus of the cycad family, this is an ancient group of plants, often considered to be prehistoric, dating from the Jurassic period. Cycads are found in the tropics and can be seen clinging to sheer limestone cliffs. I've never seen a wild one at close quarters so this was my chance to get up close and personal. Unfortunately cycads are being indiscriminately harvested as they have a great value as ornamental plants. They resemble palms or ferns but are actually related to neither.
One of the family members came out with some rambutans for us to munch on. Surprisingly these were not from the garden but from one of Dr Ghani's grateful patients. We saw quite a selection of herbs and spices, which can be used in the kitchen as well as for different remedies. My attention was distracted by a collection of pottery oil lamps of different colours and designs. Dr Ghani explained that his son makes these but hadn't yet started marketing them. They looked particularly good to me and I'm sure would be very popular to both locals as well as tourists.
Having walked around the garden, we were then led to the balai. This is a traditional wooden building on stilts, with strips of creepers and rattan etc decorating the railings. The structure itself is made out of a hard wood, which hopefully withstand the test of time. As we sat down on the floor, we were served with rice and a delicious selection of Malay dishes. Once we were sated, some more fruits arrived, as well as hot coffee.
As we relaxed and absorbed all our newly acquitted knowledge, Dr Ghani told us how he is now collecting old books and manuscripts pertaining to ancient medicines and herbs etc. Some of these books are written in Arabic, which he is able to read. He is certainly a mine of information and if you are in Langkawi, do go and visit this amazing garden and learn about these plants which can be of benefit to all mankind.
The Brunei Times
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Source URL:
http://www.bt.com.bn/en/en/focus/2007/10/03/a_garden_of_herbal_remedies
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