Chiang Mai: Handicrafts

29 Apr 06

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We land in Chiang Mai (Northern Thailand quite near the Myanmar border) and trkr exclaims, "Everybody! Look for elephants!" wholly expecting to see elephants running around outside the airplane. Wow--what it would be like to be that young again with such an imagination!

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We're staying at the Empress Hotel on the east side of Chiang Mai near the western shore of the Mae Ping River. Chiang Mai is situated at the foot of the mountains & offers a totally different side of Thailand than what you'd see in Bangkok or Southern Thailand.

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We head out on what we're quickly learning is the 'mandatory' mini-bus tour of every handicraft item factory in Chiang Mai. Many other Asian tourist-y locations have these built in factory tours that include lessons on how to make the local handi-wares--as we learned during our trip to China last year.

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SILK

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First, we explore the silk factory where we learn about the silk making process. The silk cocoons are yellow in Thailand as compared to white like we saw in China. We see the silk moth, eggs, larvae and worms.

Extracting silk from the cocoons by boiling them and gently unraveling the individual silk fiber.


Once the silk is extracted & dyed to the desired color then they weave it on looms to make the fabric. Loved this purple color on this loom. I end up purchasing a small quilt wall-hanging and fall in love with many others but decide to restrain myself knowing we'll need money to eat during the rest of our vacation. ;) Then we sit in on a Kashmir rug display. We learn about how the rugs are woven in Kashmir, that the paisley symbol refers to the moguls' signature of stamping their enclosed fist instead of using a wooden stamp, watch the rug weavers use the tools to make the rugs and then learn how to clean them.

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GEM

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Thailand is known for its gemstones. We learn about how they're found throughout Thailand. It used to be a mom & pop type operation that included panning for gems in the local streams but has progressed to this massive grid-square operation where they use major construction vehicles to sift through the dirt in search of sapphires, rubies, emeralds and diamonds. It's impressive but overwhelming! We were prevented from taking photos at the gem store for obvious reasons. Needless to say it was a facility about the size of a football field that included a short movie on the process of locating gems, walking through the factory where they cut, polish and mount the gemstones, and concludes in this Costco warehouse sized room where they had miles and miles of jewelry made with the gems. It was an awesome site but the prices didn't seem to be that great compared to what we've seen in the US. It seems to be geared toward tourists from other markets who have lots of discretionary spending money.

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LACQUERWARE

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Then, it's off to the lacquerware factory. I went in totally unimpressed with the stuff--came out with a newfound appreciation for it. I just assumed it was paper-mache and would fall apart with the first drop of water that hit the surface. Here's the lowdown-

Most lacquerware starts wtih a tightly twisted bamboo base for whatever form they're making. This form is covered in sap from the tamarind fruit tree. Then it's sanded, painted again with the sap, sanded again, a pattern is applied to it using a stencil and chalk, then gold leaf is applied using a sticky substance. Then a final coat of lacquer is applied in a dust-free room and it cures underground for several days. The stencil part of this process reminded me of transferring the image to PZKut that we use in carving letterboxing stamps.

Here's trkr helping remove the excess gold leaf from a lacquer horse.

Some lacquerware bracelets on display at the store.

What I didn't know about lacquerware is that you can put wet items in it--it's impervious to liquids & can also be 'torched' with flame and it won't burn. Who knew?

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SILVER

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Our next tour was the silversmith factory. We saw how they melted silver down, hammered it into objects, and how they created plain or ornate designs. These patterns aren't listed anywhere but rather are passed down through families.

A display on the process of creating a silver piece--from nuggets all the way to ornate silver bowls.

A man hammers a traditional design into a silver bowl.

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PAPERMAKING

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Our next tour was the paper factory. Here the lady stirs fibers from the sa tree in a large vat. Once they're at the right consistency, she runs a screen through it (much like a window screen) to pick up a thin layer of fibers/pulp, she dries it on the frame. Once dry, she removes the paper layer, paints it and applies it to a bamboo umbrella frame.

They use these traditional wooden hand drills to bore tiny little holes in the bamboo supports for the umbrella. I envisioned being able to use one of these drills to help drill holes in logbooks that we make for letterboxes.

They also use this paper to make hanging mobiles, fans, lanterns, kites and other paper items.

Next we walk through this 'artist alley' where the artists paint various designs on the paper. At some point trkr gets ahead of our group and is quickly convinced to allow an artist paint an elephant motif on his shirt. These same artists try to get me to have them paint an elephant on my backpack as we walk through the alleyway. I'm not much on adornment of anything I wear or carry--so I pass by the offer. ;)

While in the 'plein air' facility, a massive thunderstorm hits us and it begins to deluge. We assume this is an outer band of Cyclone Mala that is passing through Myanmar at the moment. Regardless, it rains fast and furiously and we quickly find very few places to step that aren't already deep puddles.
I leave the paper store with 5 unadorned bamboo 'vases' that I purchase for 10Baht each (about $0.20). The ones that are painted run about 40 Baht each ($1). I also find some interesting rosewood hand massage 'stars' & leave with a couple of handfuls of them (no pun intended).

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Our plans to take a long boat river tour along Chiang Mai's Mae Ping River that follows a couple of walls of the city falls flat when the thunderstorm passes through. Instead we decide to head out for some urban geocaching. We wander through the streets and meet a handful of travel agents from Myanmar who work for Yangon Airways. They convince us that our next travels should take us to Myanmar! ;) We walk through Chiang Mai's markets and notice vendors selling an assortment of silk, cotton clothes, wooden puzzles, lanterns, watches, jewelry--you name it. We eventually find our GC goal but the facility is closed. I guess they're on 'Thai time'--open when they want to. ;)

We continue to wander past temples, tailors and stop for dinner at Phon-Non where we order spicy chicken and lemon grass hot soup, spicy chicken, fried rice with chicken, Pad Thai, sticky rice with mango and two fruit ice shakes--lychee & rambutan. All of these items were excellent!

trkr enjoys the Pad Thai even though his expression suggests otherwise.

rnrB tasting the spicy chicken fried rice.

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Meanwhile an old Vin Diesel/Samuel L. Jackson movie dubbed in Thai drones on in the background. Noise of cars, taxis, tuk-tuks on wet pavement rings out on the street. We spend the rest of the evening haggling for items at the night market a few blocks away from our hotel.

I purchase some spices from this vendor and a couple of silk shirts and embroidered change purses. Heading home with a lifetime supply of saffron, galangal (mushroom?), coriander (cilantro), tumeric, ginger, Indian curry, Kaffirelime, chilli, lemon grass and Thai curry. Yum!

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Chiang Mai is worlds different from Bangkok. It's a smaller rural town that has few tall buildings. The lifestyle seems less rushed around here. Life here appears to revolve around the markets. We visit during the 'hot & dry' season but have only experienced massive downpours. The temps hover around 40*C. WAY hotter than we've experienced in a longtime--and folks are saying that's cool for around here for this time of year. We just miss the big 'New Year' festival in Thailand by a week (Songkrat). They celebrate Songkrat in Chiang Mai by engaging in a weeklong city water fight to help combat the extreme temperatures and the lack of rain during the season. Perhaps it's good timing to come a week later because the streets are clean? ;) We meet absolutely no other Americans besides the handful of missionaries who have descended upon our hotel for a regional Pacific rim missionary conference. Otherwise most of the tourists are Australians or Europeans.

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Tomorrow we're heading on a day-long elephant trek. Hopefully, trkr's expectations of visions of elephants will be realized...