Susanna's latest adventure...
The Silk Road
Written by Susanna Bevilacqua
I set myself on a journey… In a world of mass consumerism and speed where many of us don’t even know half of where the ingredients of the products we find on our supermarkets shelves come from, we have no idea of what our clothes are made of and how they were made, and we take it for granted that what we have now will be here forever... I set myself on a journey; I called it the Silk Road.
I wanted to find out how that beautiful soft silk scarf wrapped around a mannequin on a window display and carrying a hefty price tag was actually made. This mission took me to Laos. I heard that you could still find places where things were produced by hand using traditional methods so I wanted to see and discover with my own eyes, feel with my own hands. What I came across was much more than what I have ever expected.
Laos is a small country of only about six million people nestled between Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar, it is not surrounded by sea but is veined with rivers. When you cross the border to Laos by boat for the first time, you might think you are in a movie set. Houses on stilts made from wood and grasses, sometimes the stilts are the leftover metal bomb shells from the Vietnam war, wooden bridges, unsealed roads, rich red earth, rice fields, water buffalo, kids running around half naked occupy the landscape.
The journey began in Xieng Khoang North West of Vientiane near the Plain of Jars, in a small Fair Trade co-operative called Mulberries run by Kommaly Chanthavong. Here Kommaly awaits me... In her mid 60s, she spent the last forty years of her life encouraging villages in Laos to return to their traditional silk production and weaving using natural methods. Kommaly is a walking library when it comes to anything to do with silk, when you walk with Kommaly, she points out to all the plants that can be used as dyes and the colours they produce, if you can eat the plant or not.
The Silk Worms
The farm grows mulberry plants and serves as a nursery for the silk worms. The silk moths lay their tiny eggs and die immediately after. The eggs hatch and the journey of the worms begin. Young worms are delicate and susceptible to variation of temperatures and being eaten by insects. The nursery guarantees a safe environment of these tiny creatures, workers must wear white coats and shoes that might carry dirt and insects are not allowed. The baby worms are kept in here for 15 days.
The Cocoons
A long drive of unsealed roads takes us to a village nestled in the middle of the tropical forest. This village is called Meung Thae. It does not exist in any travel book I have read. The village specializes in raising the silk worm until it becomes a cocoon. Trays and trays of worms lying on top of fresh mulberries leaves eating all day long until on the 28th day they spin themselves a cocoon, sometimes yellow and sometimes white. The villagers welcome us with open arms, we are invited in their homes for a drink and when we leave we do not leave empty handed, we are offered a pumpkin and some taros.
The Silk Thread
In Laos silk thread is still spun by hand, no industrialized machines here, just a wooden contraption which is used for spinning, a pot of water on camping stove. The cocoons are placed in the hot water and as the fibers loosen a thread is formed. Thirty cocoons are needed to produce one silk thread. It is an amazing experience to actually see a thread being created, the base of that silken scarf, the start of something.
Spinning
Our trip takes six hours, in the centre of agriculture country in between rice fields and corn fileds, this takes us to a village called Bahn Samm where women specialized in spinning silk.
It is quite a site underneath the shade of a hut, there are about six women surrounded by all their kids, they are spinning silk while laughing and chatting away. To the western eye these people are poor but closer inspection reveal that they have so much more than what we have, a true sense of community, their children are not raised by childcares and nannies, support is always available, they are happy with what they have, they eat foods that they have grown.
The head of the women’s group welcomes us to her house, the two elder ladies of he village join us and a meal of sticky rice, boiled bamboo shoots and green leaves unknown to me are presented to us.
Silk thread needs to be spun al least six times before it is soft enough to dye.
The Dying Process
If you did not know any better you could get away with thinking that those large steaming pots overflowing with leaves, barks and fruits is some concoctions for a special potion.
The art of natural dying is complex; it takes these women seven to eight years to become experts in producing natural dyes. They need to know all the plants that can be used to produce dyes, those that can be used as a binding agents, which one can be used as a cold dye or a hot dye, how long the silk needs to cook to produce a certain colour, how to mix colours. Sometimes silk has to be dyes six or seven times before achieving a certain colour.
I leave these ladies with their dyes and cooking pots and as I leave, I pass a row of coloured silk thread drying in the sun, it is vibrant view.
The Weaving
Silk has to be spun two more times after it is dyed before it is ready for weaving.
The excitement of finally seeing how this beautiful thread is transformed into that beautiful scarf takes me to a number of villages dotted around Laos. Every house in Laos has a silk loom, for a girl in Laos learning to weave is like learning to cook, it is something that every girl does and will continue to do for the rest of her life. In Laos women weave their own skirts and their homewears, weaving is part of their daily life.
As I go from village to village to discover weaving I learn that this is a whole new journey, there are patterns and motifs used for different occasions and patterns used by different tribes, the journey has just began…….
