Tag Archives: Folk Remedy

七彩豬毛釘 (Rainbow pig-hair nail)

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 51
Occupation: Housewife
Residence: Arcadia, CA
Performance Date: 4/27/2013
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

Phonetic pronunciation of 七彩豬毛釘: chut choi ju mo deng
My mother grew up in a working-class family in Hong Kong.  On one hand, my mother’s family was living in an industrialzing culture; on the other hand, her parents came from Southern Chinese villages.  So there’s a lot of beliefs and practices that they carried over from their village lives.

My mother learned a folk medicinal practice from her mother when she had a fever as a child.  Her mother used an old folk remedy, the 七彩豬毛釘, to cure my mother of her fever.

The 七彩豬毛釘 is made of rice flour, hot water, and an egg.  The preparation of the remedy is really simple – you heat some water and add the rice flour and egg to it.  There is no specified amount of each ingredient that you have to put into the remedy.  You just have to create the right consistency that lets you knead the mixture into a piece of dough.  While it is still hot, you roll the ball of dough along the back of the sick person.

The person who prepared the 七彩豬毛釘 then breaks open the ball.  If the treatment worked properly, there should be tiny hairs of all colors stuck in the dough (七彩 means “rainbow” in Chinese – the hairs are also described as looking like pig-hairs, 豬毛).  My mother attests that she saw her mother break the ball open and found rainbow-colored hairs inside.  After the treatment, her fever reduced.
My mother recreated the treatment for me (I was curious), but since I did not have a fever, she was unable to actually apply the remedy.

What I find very interesting is that the remedy has a visual confirmation associated with it.  The remedy’s power comes from contagious magic — the illness of the patient transfers into the piece of dough when it contacts the patient’s skin.  My mother didn’t particularly remember any explanation as to why the illness would turn into rainbow-colored hairs, she just knows that it reduced her fever.  Nobody is allowed to eat the dough after the treatment either, which would make sense since contagious magic has transferred what’s causing the illness into the dough.

“For indigestion, prick your finger with a needle and let the bad blood out.”

Nationality: Korean
Age: 29
Occupation: International Student
Residence: Westwood
Primary Language: Korean
Language: English

“For indigestion, prick your finger with a needle and let the bad blood out.”
As my informant says, this is a remedy that is commonly used among Korean parents. Whenever someone is suffering from indigestion, the fastest and most relieving solution is to prick the tip of any finger and let a small amount of blood out.
Korean people believe in the existence of “bad” and “good” blood. Therefore, they believe that indigestion is a result of too much “bad” blood pooling in one life. In order to provide relief, the blood must be released so that the body can find some comfort.

“Take a shot of whiskey for a hangover.”

Nationality: Korean
Age: 58
Occupation: Manager
Residence: South Korea
Primary Language: Korean

“Take a shot of whiskey for a hangover.”
Although this hangover remedy seems to have absolutely no basis in reason or medical knowledge, my informant swears by it. Every time he has a hangover, he takes a shot of whiskey–no matter how badly he wants to throw up.
Perhaps this remedy works for my informant because whiskey is so strong that it can probably force a person to momentarily forget about any nausea or sickness. In addition, Korean males firmly believe in the power of alcohol as a remedy for anything.

Puerto Rican Folk Remedy for Laryngitis

Nationality: Italian-American, Puerto Rican
Age: 56
Occupation: Registered Nurse
Residence: San Diego, California
Performance Date: 3.23.12
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish, Italian

A remedy for Laryngitis described verbatim by informant:

“A remedy from my Puerto Rican mother and it is using lamb fat, just lamb fat, put a little piece of lamb fat in a snifter, that is like brandy snifter and then you pour a little bit of brandy in it and you light it until it goes out, it burns up really all the fat and all the, pretty much all the alcohol. You have to do it at night right before you’re gonna go to bed, because you don’t want to speak after you drink it. You just go to bed, you wrap something around your neck to keep your neck warm, you drink it down like in shot, like you swig it, and the next day you always have you always have your voice completely back, your laryngitis is gone. I don’t know why, but it is. And it’s lamb fat—not bacon fat, not beef fat. Lamb fat, fat of the lamb.

I know in Puerto Rico in the 20’s and 30’s, in the Caribbean, there were not a lot of doctors usually, there was one doctor in the whole town, so there were a lot of remedies that were home remedies, herb remedies that people used. And it works! I love it because it works, and it’s from my mother. I love it because it’s Puerto Rican, it’s my mothers. I have used it with my own family, even when they were super little. Absolutely.”

I am not well versed in the science of how this remedy is effective, but my guess would be that since, as my informant said, people in Puerto Rico were often left to their own devices when they got sick, burning lamb fat in brandy is a pretty logical choice. The flambéed lamb fat might provide some soothing, coating quality to the throat while the alcohol or heated brandy probably provides some antiseptic quality. Doing this before bed makes sense because you don’t salivate in your sleep, so the medicine can “stay” in your throat and do its thing. Why it only works with lamb fat is not within my knowledge but my informants was insistent that that’s the only fat that works.

Mint or Chamomile Tea: Folk Remedy

Nationality: Mexican, American
Age: 43
Occupation: Housekeeper
Residence: San Diego, California
Performance Date: 3.23.12
Primary Language: Spanish
Language: English

Mint or Chamomile Tea is a folk remedy for stomach ache:

“We use mint or chamomile for stomach ache. Those are the two popular things. Some people add a little bit sugar to make it taste better. But some people like the tea without sugar because they say it’s a medicine it shouldn’t have sugar.”

Sugarless mint tea and sugarless chamomile tea is a folk remedy my informant learned at a young age in León, Guanajuato, México. It makes sense that folk remedy would be used considering the difficulty buying medicine in the impoverished conditions my informant grew up in.