Page 19 - Demo

Health & HealingISSUE 36 APRIL 2025 19and are the size of a thumbnail. They look like ticks without the legs. The seed has a hard smooth skin and has to be crushed in order to reach the oily interior. It is not as hard as the macadamia seed and can be crushed between the thumb and fore finger. A fact sheet of the tree is available here and factual information about it is readily available on the internet.To understand the process of oil extraction from the seeds I visited an old lady friend who took me through the steps. When the seeds have been collected they are roasted while still in their shells on a piece of broken pot, rugio, much like roasting peanuts is done today on a frying pan. The roasted seeds are then wrapped in a leather skin garment, (one without hair), and beaten with a stick so that they are crushed to a paste. The paste is then placed into a pot, Nyungu and water added to nearly full. This is then placed on the fireplace, riko and cooked for several hours. The oil floats on the water and is then carefully drained onto a calabash and then into an oil storage container, Kinandu. The oil is drained as a clean extra virgin grade 1 first and a less pure grade containing some crushed shells finally. This second grade is used to soften all the leather clothes and leather carrying straps, mioho and mikwa. They are spread out in the sun to dry and they become wonderfully soft and shiny. The grade 1 oil is stored for toning the skin, hairdressing and other ceremonies. To leave a pot of cooking castor oil unattended was taboo. This is understandable as the Gikuyu woman%u2019s dwelling, Nyumba was highly flammable and the cooking of this oil a high-risk affair.MUKUYU: Did you also use the oil from a sheep to tone your skin?Here the woman informant looked shocked and disbelieving. In fact her reaction can only best be described if we revert to the original language in which the conversation was held, Gikuyu. Essentially she explained that she was not a man to go smelling like an animal and without mincing words made it clear that men are animals and that it was for this reason that they smear animal fat on themselves. Women, according to her can only ingest animal fat but for beauty purposes, a woman%u2019s oil is castor oil. I