Burning Tite Pati: Healing Practices of the Indigenous Himalayan Peoples

This paper is an offering of knowledge-keeping that emerged from a collaboration with the author and her grandmothers. It honours and celebrates the food and medicine of the indigenous Himalayan people—medicine that comes from the soil and into the kitchen, which fills their stomachs and hearts and feeds their souls. To the author and her community, this food is not just medicine. Rather, it is complementary both to the needs of the body, and those of the soil—it is sustainable, organic and regenerative. The author puts this work together with the intention to acknowledge her grandmothers as keepers of these bodies of knowledge, practiced and honed over thousands of years, silenced but still not forgotten. Emerging from the times she spent with her grandmothers in her forest, or sitting at their feet listening to them, she shares her learnings and insights about these rituals and practices through illustrations.