Teguh Suprayitno, Muaro Jambi, Indonesia – Mbok Hawo picked a clutch of galangal, lemongrass and turmeric as the gaggle of schoolkids assembled by an array of potted plants, arranged in Hawo's garden like bottles in a medicine cabinet.
"Turmeric isn't only for flavoring cooking," the 64-year-old healer explained to the children. "It can also be a medicine for the stomach."
Generations of Indigenous healers like Hawo have drawn on the forest floor to treat minor ailments and ward off more serious health conditions. However, here in Muaro Jambi district on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, many parents worry about the loss of know-how to spot medicinal plants, as modern distractions compete for children's attention spans.
More than two decades ago, a group of Muaro Jambi residents formed Rumah Menapo, a civil society group dedicated to preserving local culture. Ever since, members of Rumah Menapo like Mukhtar Hadi, the founder, have worked to enable their ancient history to live side by side with contemporary Islamic culture.
Mukhtar and members of the Rumah Menapo community understood more than a decade ago the risks that young people wouldn't learn about the local history and culture.
"I don't want them to forget or not know about the history of the place where they were born and raised," Mukhtar told Mongabay Indonesia.
In 2010, Mukhtar helped found the Sekolah Alam, or Nature School, a voluntary initiative staffed by Indigenous elders like Hawo.
The school's teachers help young people identify herbal tonics, and apply the range of senses to the plants growing around their community. Children are also taught to feel the consistency and texture of a species. They learn the subtle variations in a plant's aroma, and the nuances in its taste.
Hawo showed the children a handful of binahong, a plant whose heart-shaped leaves have long been used in traditional medicine to soothe gout, high blood pressure and other complaints.
"The leaves are boiled," Hawo explained. "And then you drink them."
Some locals say they believe that, a long time ago, a sand miner working in the Batanghari River found an old tin scroll with text in Sanskrit spelling out the health benefits of using betel and sugarcane grass – beliefs that remain engrained among Muaro Jambi's healers.
"Betel is known as a medicinal plant in our village," Mukhtar explained. "Its leaves are red, green and black and can cure 99 types of disease."
Cultural heritage remains a vital, if threatened, framework for daily life among Indigenous communities here. Muaro Jambi's local history has also received national attention.
In April 2022, Indonesian President Joko Widodo visited a temple here that used to serve as a place of Indigenous education.
"In the seventh century this center was one of the largest in Asia, not only pertaining to theology," President Joko Widodo said at the time. "This cultural heritage of Muaro Jambi Temple was once a center for medical education and medicine, then philosophy, architecture and art."
For many here in Muaro Jambi, conservation of these traditions amounts to an ancestral duty. The Buddhist Muaro Jambi temple complex has been dated to the seventh century until the temples became stranded assets in 1278.
Some believe the Buddhist site was the birthplace of the Buddhist Sriwijaya kingdom. Today, the intact temples stand just a few hundred meters from a mosque where many here pray today.
"We need to preserve this history so that the roots of civilization are known," Mukhtar said.
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"Our motto is, 'Everyone is a teacher, the universe is my school,'" Mukhtar said.
At the time of writing, 20-30 children from grades 4 to 6 were taking part in Sekolah Alam programs held every Sunday morning. A schoolgirl wearing an earth-colored Islamic head covering and a blindfold learned to recognize a lemongrass root by its scent alone.
At first, the project was focused on the community's most prominent archaeological site, the Buddhist temple complex.
"We went for a walk to the temple first," Mukhtar said. "From there we started to introduce history and culture."
Teaching materials are taken from the forest and the ground. Clay is used a medium. Pandan leaves are harvested to teach traditional weaving techniques.
"We use what is available in nature for learning," Mukhtar said.
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Preserving the water quality in the Batanghari River today receives the same level of attention as the adat Indigenous traditions formed long ago.
"We want to instill a love of the environment in these children from an early age," Mukhtar said.
Rumah Menapo's education program extends beyond Indigenous culture to practical environmental protection. The school takes students on guided walks to collect plastic waste littering the riverbank. Rumah Menapo volunteers have helped children plant 150 seedling of Samanea saman, a species of pea tree.
This education program takes place as people in Muaro Jambi worry that local coal storage facilities threaten the traditional way of life.
"When I was a child, the water of the Batanghari River was a clear green when the level was high," one local father told Mongabay Indonesia. "Now, the water is cloudy, like milk."
Many here blame the coal stockpiles and rise of factories along the river for the increase in pollution.
Mukhtar said he hopes the Sekolah Alam program will raise awareness among local children, enabling young people to make positive choices as they become adults and have families of their own.
"At the very least they will no longer litter," he said. "They will understand that what is happening today is due to human actions."
The school relies on the will of people here to pass on the knowledge gathered over centuries in Muaro Jambi.
"Finding friends who are sincere and willing to teach takes effort," Mukhtar said. "Because in the nature school there are no salaries, we make the school free."
Mbok Hawo sits cross-legged in a fuchsia smock with floral detail on a rattan met together with the youngsters as they take notes on the nuances of local plants.
"It's because in the future they can inherit this," she said. "It's so that the knowledge is not lost."