For the past few weeks I lived and worked at the Eva de Maya Center in rural Northern Malawi. The center was founded 10 years ago, and includes homeopathic training for local people (here I am with my 13 "students") as well as a clinic where visiting homeopaths like me get to practice in a very different setting than what we are used to. Two of the students work fulltime in the clinic, and were my translators/collaborators as we saw anywhere from 20 - 50 people per day. We treated a huge variety of conditions, from respiratory viruses to tooth abscesses, mastitis, urinary or reproductive issues, asthma, malnutrition, heart disease, cancer, AIDS, malaria, septic wounds, and some truly fearsome skin conditions - things not even many Western doctors will ever see!
Without electricity and therefore without computers, our work was done the old-fashioned way, by hand. Patients arrived before 7:30 a.m. and would wait patiently outside the clinic under the grass-roofed "gazebo" for their turn. After a short consultation, I would assess, prescribe and dispense the remedy on the spot - and was surprised at how often a clear picture of a remedy was revealed simply through a few physical symptoms and modalities as described by the patient. Given the wide variety of people and conditions I treated, my few weeks there was the equivalent of several years' worth of experience!
Of particular amazement to me was how well people with serious illness such as AIDS or acute malaria respond to homeopathic remedies. A few patients were so violently ill that I felt they should go to the medical clinic, however they had no money (read this literally - NO money!) and therefore couldn't afford to go whereas our clinic treats people for free. It was astounding to see the improvement, often within 24 hours after receiving a homeopathic remedy and they would be back to their normal life.
For those diagnosed with AIDS, each person receives a particular remedy specially created for AIDS sufferers and almost everyone on this remedy has done extremely well. Of course highly successful homeopathic treatments are still ignored or even attacked by foreign governments/pharmaceutical companies but for those afflicted people just wanting to carry on with life and raise their children, this treatment has been an affordable miracle with no dangerous side-effects.
Living in rural third world Africa is very basic but the center provided simple, comfortable accommodations for guests. I even got used to the "toilet" - a keyhole-shaped hole in the ground you had to squat over (although one day my sandal accidentally slipped off my foot, right down the hole - ack!). I was given plain but ample meals and each morning a bucket of water was heated over a fire to use for bathing. The only other guest at the center was a Malawian medical doctor working at the center's allopathic clinic and through him, I learned much more about Malawi. He actually came to our clinic for me to treat his dangerously high blood pressure (even with medication), haemorrhaging of the esophagus, malaise and abdominal pain. It's a little daunting to have a medical doctor as a patient, especially when you eat breakfast, lunch and dinner together every day - I needed to get his prescription right! Happily, within 24 hours he began to experience a huge improvement and after that dropped by our clinic regularly to borrow homeopathic books to read!
