Even though I've made this trip several times before, it doesn't seem to get any easier. First, I have to get to Kolkata from wherever I am. Hopefully I have a train ticket booked, but sometimes the tickets are sold out so I just have to get to the station and hope for a cancellation. Having said that, I've never had anyone check my ticket on the train and I'm sure there are plenty of passengers who don't have one.
After 5 hours on the train heading north towards the border of Bangladesh, I finally reach my first destination. This is where I have to stay overnight at a hotel I refer to as 'Stalag 13'. It's not that it's dirty or unsafe, just very Spartan - a bed, one fluorescent light and a tiny window that looks out onto an identical room opposite.
The next morning I set out by car to the weavers' village. It takes 1-2 hours depending on the state of the careening, tooting traffic and how many head-on collisions we encounter on the way. Surprisingly, you very rarely see accidents on Indian roads, but in rural West Bengal, the roads are very narrow and in poor condition so it's not unusual to come across a smash here.
Though this is the most difficult destination to get to, it's also my favourite place to visit. There are many weaving co-ops in this district but my contact is a lovely man called Nani who organises this particular group of weavers.
There used to be 8000 weavers in this district, now there are only 2000. This is partly due the younger generation moving away to find more lucrative jobs in the city, but also because of the lack of domestic interest in handmade products. I have seen this happen in all crafts across India, and these craftspeople are acutely aware that without international interest in this type of product, it will die out completely.
Though the majority of the weavers live in the village and this is their full-time employment, many of the weavers that Nani works with are farmers who weave part-time for extra money. Every house in the area has at least one loom which enables the weavers to work in between their other jobs. These people never leave their district, speak no English or Hindi, and without the support of a co-op, have no way of selling their products except in the nearest village.
Nani supplies them with the raw materials for spinning and weaving and then commits to buying the finished product from them, less the cost of raw materials. Each weaver has their own specialty ranging from the finest silk and jamdani, to coarser cottons that the local people wear and use every day. Nani doesn't specify what each weaver makes, but encourages them to create something new if they can.
To help solve the problem of the disappearing weavers of this region, Nani has started recruiting young women, after they've finished their schooling, to take up the craft. While waiting for a suitable marriage match, women of this age are often involved in the other processes involved with weaving, such as spinning or finishing, but weaving is predominately a male dominated occupation.
Nani took me to meet a young woman of 19 who has only been weaving for a year. She was working on a large windowpane check which is a challenging fabric. When I asked Nani if women were better weavers than men, he replied, "Men are strong and fast but not perfect. Women are a bit slower but they're much more careful and their weaving is superior." He said that when this young woman first started weaving she used to cry every day, but within a year she has become his number one cotton weaver.
Despite taking these measures to ensure the survival of this cottage industry, Nani fears that the weavers of West Bengal will eventually disappear completely and with them, his livelihood.
Like most Westerners, my reaction to this situation was to try and find a solution. I try not to assume that I know what would make their lives better, so I ask Nani what I could do to help. I imagine he's going to say schools, water, healthcare, but this was his answer...
"These people are village people, they don't want to have to leave their homes and families to find work. They are lucky because they have a skill, but we need to sell the fabric for them. We need to connect your people to my people. We need to get the products from their hands to your hands."
That was the abridged version, but maybe you can start to understand why the weavers of West Bengal have a special place in my heart - it's not just the four-course lunch that Nani's Mum makes me or the afternoon naps among the fabric. They are kind, gentle and generous people who welcome me into their homes every time I visit, and their incredible skills never cease to amaze me.
Lunch, naps, visits to the spinners, warpers, weavers and dyers being over, it was time to do the entire journey in reverse. But first...one more night at Stalag 13.
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I have been here before and already have a supplier, but I really wanted to see the weavers in action so I had to go a bit further afield.
My destination was a family weaving unit 100kms from Hyderabad. A quick trip you may think, but it takes about and hour and a half to get to the outskirts of the city. I kept receiving anxious phone calls from my host to find out when I would arrive. More than 3 hours later I turned up on their doorstep after a harrowing drive through holiday traffic.
I was greeted by Srikanth, a lovely young man who was now in charge of the family business. Of course the entire extended family was also there to receive the Madam From Australia, along with a reporter from the local newspaper who photographed my every move.
The main source of income for this family is actually the manufacture of dhotis (a sarong-like garment that men wear) with decorative borders. Ikat fabric has become very expensive for them to make due to the labour shortage caused by the younger people moving away from the village to more lucrative jobs in the city.
Traditionally, ikats are produced by a family unit who have their own distinctive designs. Usually, the women do the warp and weft tying and dyeing, while the men weave the fabric on a handloom, an extremely slow process. It takes 2-3 weeks to weave 50 metres of fabric by hand, a job which can be done in 2-3 days on a power loom.
For this reason, most single ikats (the pattern is dyed on the warp only) are now produced on a power loom. Double ikats (the design is dyed on the warp and weft) must always be be woven on a handloom to allow the weaver to adjust the weft thread on every pass of the shuttle, which produces the classical feathered ikat pattern.
So we toured the village. they were loading bobbins, warping, tying and dyeing and finally, I got to see them weaving. Just one catch...I had arrived in Hyderabad at the beginning of a week-long festival and the handloom weavers had already gone to visit family in other villages (insert my unimpressed face here). But still, I got to see the power looms in action. Surprisingly it still requires a lot of human interaction since the looms need to be attended to, and adjusted throughout the weaving process. The weaver told me that each loom has it's little idiosyncrasies and needs to be watched over like a child.
Then, just as I thought I'd get to look at the actual fabric, there was lunch. It was 4.30, any thoughts of lunch had been replaced by dreams of dinner for me by now.
More family members had been conscripted to organise lunch for me. This is how it unfolded - Madam and the menfolk sat on the floor. All the women of the household rushed around with their designated bowl of food, serving us. This was a home cooked Telugu meal of rice (a serve about the size of my head), spinach, mint curry, mango chutney and what looked like Twisties(?).
It was huge and delicious, and while I tried to look as elegant as possible sitting on the floor, eating rice with my hands, with the entire family watching, I don't think I did a good job of it. From previous family lunches, I've learnt never to finish the food on your plate, otherwise you will be given more. In this case I was told, if you don't have second helping, it means you didn't enjoy the food. Then half a bowl of soup was slopped over my remaining rice, a difficult task for the novice, I assure you.
Then finally, the fabric. I learnt a lot about thread counts, weaving techniques and fabric finishing which was all fascinating, but in the end, it's the colour and texture of fabric that seduces me every time. I didn't really need any stock, I was just trying to find an alternative ikat source and learn more about the production process, but I'm a sucker for ikats. So yes, I bought some. Coming home on the slow boat from India to a fabric store near you.
Next stop, Bhubaneswar in Odisha, where they combine two of my favourite things - ikat and silk. Or possibly they'll still be on holidays and I'll leave empty handed, who knows?
Oh, and news from my Gujarati family - we're still in touch every couple of days and are meeting up in Ahmedabad in a week or so. I think I've found my Indian forever home!
]]>Experience has taught me that things often don't go to plan in India. Planes get cancelled, trains are late, weddings or festivals mean that suppliers might not be available when you are, so with this in mind, it pays to have a Plan B, and remain as flexible as possible.
If you follow Woven Stories on Instagram, you would have seen what I got up to in Jaipur and surrounds. Block prints were hunted down, purchased or ordered - everything from indigo khadis to light cotton florals. I have my favourite places to go but I'm always on the lookout for something new, and now that I've been trading for 6 months, I've got a better idea of what my customers want. I'll be back in Jaipur at the end of the month so I've left some suppliers till then.
Next stop, Bhuj in Gujarat. Here's where things started to go a little off-piste. I had to catch a plane to Mumbai to get another flight to Bhuj. My last Instagram post was sent from Mumbai airport...see you in an hour in Bhuj (I thought).
I have no one but myself to blame for what happened next, after all, I was the one who booked all the flights. My ticket destination was Bhavnagar (airport code BHU, which is almost Bhuj, right?), and even though we flew on a tiny prop plane that I had very little confidence in, I did in fact arrive there.
It should have been a clue when my hotel pickup didn't appear. Of course fifty taxi drivers then offered me their services, but none of them spoke much English and didn't seem to know the hotel I was booked into.
I did what any English speaking person would do at this point and said loudly, "English? Does anybody speak English?" A young Indian man stepped forward and said with a Gujurati accent, "Yes, I am Australian, what seems to be the problem?" He asked to see my plane ticket and my hotel booking confirmation and then said very calmly, "Hmm, I see the problem, you are in Bhavanagar and your hotel is in Bhuj 450km away, but don't worry, we will fix everything."
My immediate thought was, BUGGER!!!, but that passed, because when you're in an unexpected place and a complete stranger tells you they'll take care of your problem , all you can do is trust that they will.
Things moved swiftly from this point. Another local family who were picking up an uncle from Florida, heard of my plight, whisked me into one of their 3 cars and took me back to their house.
Then the family went into overdrive, first booking me a bus ticket (which was later deemed to be unsuitable as I had to change buses in the middle of the night) and then organising a driver to arrive in an hour who would drive me for 7 hours overnight to get me to Bhuj. Thoughts at this time included "RAPE, PILLAGE, ROBBERY, CRASH, CRASH, CRASH! " (yes, I think in capitals) but the family assured me that the driver was reliable, so I went with the plan.
In the meantime, I sat down to dinner with the family. They were utterly delightful, well-educated, lively conversationalists who stuffed me full of Gujurati delicacies, then packed me a bag of provisions to take on the journey. Many photos were taken - mostly by them. Phone numbers were exchanged - all of theirs for 2 of mine. I was made to eat (more), drink 2 glasses of water, and then sent to pee (did I need help in the bathroom? No, I have been going to the toilet on my own for many years now, but I did manage to spray myself with toilet water from their baffling array of taps, so perhaps I should have accepted the offer).
The driver, who spoke little English, was instructed to stop every 2 hours for a bathroom break - a welcome respite from the road, as night-driving in India is not for the faint-hearted. Overloaded trucks, tooting horns, flashing headlights and swerving traffic are not conducive to sleep. Thankfully, I received a phone call from a member of my new family, as well as the original young man from the airport, every hour on the trip to make sure I was still alive.
So, after a night in the car cocooning myself in white light and summoning up assistance from everyone including Baby Jesus and Ganesh, I finally arrived at my hotel in Bhuj at 4.30 this morning. I've had a day off, I felt like I deserved it!
You may think I'm a little insane after last nights events, but to tell the truth, I live for moments like this - it's one of the advantages of travelling solo. I'm guessing if I had a travelling companion this probably wouldn't have happened because unlike me, they would have checked Google maps. It did make me wonder though, would I go out of my way to help a stranger to this extent?
It's back to work tomorrow. I'm looking at Ajrakh blockprints, bandhani and organic khadi weaves while I'm here, so stay tuned for the next instalment - Bhuj and beyond, unless of course something unexpected happens!
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