The scent leaf is called Nchuanwu in the central Igbo language. Nchu-, which means to chase, and -anwu, which means two vastly different things depending on who you ask or what they hear first.

Every Igbo person I have asked in my circle seems conflicted by it. We argue for minutes and conclude that Nchuanwu’s translation is open-ended and dependent on how it is pronounced or written. After all, it is ‘Nchuanwu,’ that is mostly written in textbooks and on the internet with no tonal marks whatsoever. 

With the pronunciations due to the tonal marks, ánwụ̄ means sun, and ánwụ́ means mosquito. Depending on the direction of your research you will find supporting postulations for both sun and mosquitoes, mostly mosquitoes because Nchuanwu is widely known to reduce the population of insects in living spaces. But it is also a plant that grows up to five feet and requires full sun to germinate. 

And so I choose the sun.