**Pictures soon - internet too slow to upload them at the moment**
Yesterday we started the morning off as usual with breakfast at 8:00, Thai lesson from 8:45 to 10:45, and TEFL lessons from 11:00 to 12:00. Then we all piled into two vans (one of which had some sweet karaoke equipment in it – all in Thai though) and took off for a town called “Nawa”. Our field director had told us that she wanted to send us some information about it but all she could find was that “it is a town in the middle of nowhere”. So we didn’t quite know what to expect. It turns out to be this little village about an hour from where we are staying that specializes in silk and instrument making. It was quite the place. We got tours of the wats, and there were a lot considering the small size of the town. We also got to tour several silk factories. It wasn’t a factory in the traditional sense though, definitely not industrial. There were maybe 40 looms in each factory and they had a store selling their products. Everything was beautiful and the looms were so intricate! I can’t imagine making silk for hours every day. It seemed so tedious. All of the workers (who were all women) were so happy to see us and took dozens of pictures. They took our arm in theirs and towed us around the factory and chattered with (read: at) us. It was a ton of fun. We didn’t buy any products but I’m sure we’ll go back before we leave.
After the silk factories we went to a smaller part of the village where they specialize in handcrafted traditional Thai instruments. Again, everyone was so receptive and quite happy to see us. I’ll have to find the name of these instruments but they’re quite different than the ones we have in the US. And completely made by hand. There were several men working on them when we arrived. They went into an improptu song and dance for us which was awesome to watch. Then they let us play the instruments ourselves, which was pretty tough! Just a couple of those instruments together makes a wonderful song though. Again, most of us want to go back to purchase some of the instruments before we leave Thailand.
No comments:
Post a Comment