Learning About La Yerberia

            

 
 



Yerberias have been accessed by my family members as far as I could remember, but I had never bothered to look into them in more detail. As a child, my grandmother would make remedios or remedies for almost everything. One of her famous remedies would be “ el remedio de empacho”, which consisted of different herbs and plants which could only be found in yerberias or in her back yard garden, this remedio was given to me a couple of times. It never sparked my curiosity before, to know what was used in my grandmothers’ remedios and where she obtained all the strange herbs used. My first time going to a yerberia was truly a pleasant and overall interesting cultural experience. The owner of the yerberia was very attentive and tried to help you in any way possible. I decided to ask her about el ojo de venado, the eye of the deer,since as a child my grandmother had me wear a bracelet along with a necklace which had an ojo de venado  attached.  My grandmother explained to me that its use was to remove all the consequences produced by spirits that have looked at me or, el mal de ojo . El mal de ojo has the capacity to make the young child sick, cry a lot, and not be able to sleep, along with other unpleasant symptoms. The owner of the yerberia stated that for young children the ojo de venado could only be used for the mal de ojo, unlike la mano de azabache, the hand of azabache. Azabache is a rock from Brazil used on a small bracelet, the azabache rock is used against magia negra or black magic. According to the Yerbera, the black magic can be placed upon you in many ways, and can have different effects which can include diarrhea, jealousy, stress, depression, etc.