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'Whenever I am feeling not well I come, and she gives me some treatment.'
Caitlin: How long have you been coming?
Saturday: I started treatment here, it is now coming up to nine months. Whenever I am feeling not well I come and she gives me some treatment. Before I tested HIV positive she used to treat me; I had some skin diseases. When she discovered I was having some signs of HIV, she referred me for testing. When I tested positive, (I started) getting treatment knowing I was sick. Definitely I have made a normal life because I’m not the first, I’m not the last. I know if God wishes medicine to cure the disease, those who will be there will get healed.
Satuday translates Nattembo: She says that normally with a chest problem she goes and collects different herbs, boils them, and then, before administered them, she does some checking with the patient.
Normally when she is treating, different patients get different treatments according to the way she sees the cases. I have been experiencing a kind of flu and cough and the reason is this, I have been far up country and the season is dry. That does not require going down deep into traditional checking. But it depends on how the patient has come. It may be that they are badly off. If the patient is very upset and looks confused, then she would apply some other steps which requires more traditional (Interventions). But with this minor case she knows how to handle me even if she does not go into details of traditional practices.
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'I know I have come to the right person the way you can see a child riding away from danger, going to the mother. Yes.'
Satuday and Nattembo enter her shrine and are seated. After some discussion between them Satuday translates:
She was asking, do you take traditional medicine or conventional? I answered her by saying I have been taking the medicine that she gave me, and I went to my village and it finished. That is why I came back for more. Saturday says he is trusting that medicine because it has worked on him. Without the dust from the village he doesn't think it would have come back. She asks him to come nearer and puts her hands on his head.
Rose gives further translation: She was trying to explain the type of herbs she is going to give. She told him 'I am just going to give you powdered medicine, put it in water. After two days come back, I will have that for you or more drugs for the headache, and also the flu'. She was also explaining further how he is going administer the herbs.
Saturday: Now another point, I’ve told her I normally experience a headache, normally here (pointing to his head). She said since I am having flu this period of dry season, normally when the temperature is very high, these veins find it very difficult to transport blood to the midbrain. So it causes blockage. She told me she will be giving me medicine to wash the head and relieve the headache. In three days she tells me to come back and she is promising me that it will help.
Nattembo wraps herbs and gives them to her patient.
C: How do you feel now after coming and sharing your problem?
Saturday: Since I have been receiving treatment from her for some time and (when I first came I was) badly off, very ill, I definitely know I have come to the right place. I definitely feel more or less relieved because she is treating me and the medicine she has given me has assisted me. So when I come, I know I have come to the right person the way you can see a child riding away from danger going to the mother, yes.
C: I am very happy for you that you have found someone who can help you.
Saturday: Well I think I am also very happy with her, with you as well, and with Theta. It is through her that I have come to know Theta. I remember they organized a workshop, I was invited. I learned more from them and when I meet you, I know you are not here for nothing. You are here because you want to help. Thank you very much.