Medicine book requires second printing

By Rick Garrick

THUNDER BAY – Pic River’s Raphael Moses has been so successful with his recently-printed traditional medicines book, Holistic Adventures, that he’s ordered a second printing.

“The book sales are going great – we’re making another 250 copies,” says Moses, who began studying traditional medicines with the Elders about 35 years ago. “A lot of youth are buying this book.”

Moses has already sold about 250 copies of his 106-page book to customers across Manitoba and northern Ontario.

“People come all the way from Round Lake, Sandy Lake and they’re buying books,” Moses says. “They’re coming right to Thunder Bay to pick up (my) books.”

Moses says his customers have been “amazed” by the book, which describes the physical, spiritual, mental and emotional aspects of health and features pictures of herbs, barks and roots as well as information about what they are used for, where they can be found, when to pick them, how to dry them and how to prepare them.

“It talks about the different plants, the different trees, the different body parts,” Moses says. “Right here in our land, in our back door — out there is our pharmacy.”

Moses began working on the book last fall after seeing a number of Elders pass on without sharing their knowledge of the traditional medicines.

“The younger people are saying ‘it’s about time somebody did something like this’,” Moses says. “But I’m still looking for sponsorships so we can put this into different languages.”

Moses plans to approach the Ontario Arts Council for a grant to have the book translated into northern Ontario’s First Nation languages.

“Right now I’m going for Ojibwe, Cree, Ojicree,” Moses says. “I also want to put it into French and other languages.”

Although some people have raised concerns about the documenting of traditional knowledge in book form, Moses says the youth have been supportive.

“The young people said ‘it’s about time — we have no one to go, no one to teach us,’” Moses says. “Now it’s our time.”

Moses has been promoting and selling his book at a variety of locations in the Thunder Bay area, including an Ontario Arts Council book market and a Lakehead University marketplace event.

Moses also planned on being at the Thunder Bay Regional Health Centre in early April and making a donation towards the cancer centre.

By then, 51 participants had signed up for a series of medicine walks Moses was planning for June in the Thunder Bay area.

He plans to publish a book on healthy foods in the future, and offers a couple of general health tips that anyone can do: drink more water and exercise more.

“Water is very important. It detoxifies your body, then after that it flushes out the chemicals inside your body that are not supposed to be there. So everyone needs to get back to drinking pure water.”

To purchase copies, email  HOLISTICADVENTURES56@GMAIL.COM