ROAD BLOG AHEAD

I haven’t missed the fact that most of the comments on this blog come from my friends in various fiber arts communities. I do know that spinners, knitters, weavers and others who work with string, sticks, fabric and colour tend to be a chatty lot, nonetheless, I really love reading comments and I want to encourage them. This is going to be a blog about stuff like fur and spindles, string and what it can become in skilled hands here in the Himalayas. There’s so very very much I want to show you, but it’ll take a little time to show it all and tell you all about what I see around me up here.

Today’s blog was inspired by this Tibetan woman on the street this morning, doing what women in developing nations have done since the dawn of time - working (she sells odds and ends from a street stall) while keeping one eye on her child and the other on the drop spindle in her hands:

She is the skill sister of the women who spun these two huge balls of yarn for me over the summer:

That’s yak wool and the open sack behind the two half kilo balls is full of more yak down prepared for spinning. A friend from Spiti, in the high Himalayas at the borderlands, brought these down to me along with three other sacks full of hand-sheared, washed fleece - one white, one grey and one nearly black. These fleece are from the sheep that graze the valleys up in Lahoul and Spiti and they’re dual purpose sheep - they give both fleece and, eventually, after a fairly long life, meat for the stew pot. In places like this it’s a compromise; the meat is not particularly tender and the wool is not particularly soft, but both will do for survival.

The fleece have been machine carded into roving. In their spare time, spinners will turn it into a strong singles yarn.

Generally the spun yarn is used to weave these:

Traditional plaid shepherd’s blankets/shawls. What you can’t see in this picture is that the shawl is made from two strips of wool cloth woven on a backstrap loom and then stitched together to make a wider piece that serves the people who live outdoors as all kinds of warmth and shelter. The one above is a finer version than many, woven as a gift for me. The pattern is more intricate than in the other, more primative version I own, also a gift. That first one is much coarser, but it is also warmer and felted from use into an almost waterproof blanket. The fancy piece is edged in red and orange, also traditional, but the yarn is commercial. The older one has a simple band of madder-dyed colour at either end.
The first year we were here, I saw a few old shepherds and goatherds wandering down out of the hills with their flocks wrapped in these plaid shawls, barefoot, with tattered lunghis (cotton sarongs) around their waists. This gentleman came by on the road selling lengths of cotton cloth. I bought some of his yardage, but also tried to buy the shawl he was wearing, in hopes the money would entice him to part with a traditional garment I’d never actually seen for sale anywhere. He laughed at me. You don’t sell the warmest garment you own when you plan to spend the winter in the mountains. These are made by a family member for the one who needs it. I still haven’t seen any for sale which is one reason why I so treasure the ones I’ve been given as gifts. And they are warm in winter!

A last thing for this post and more another day. Around here, soap grows on trees:

These are “soap nuts” also called Ritha or, in the local dialect, ohkra. They are the seed pods of a very common tree and, in September they drop their golden nuts which are gathered, dried and have the hard pit removed. The casing that is left is almost 100% pure saponin. Around here, people pulverize them and use the powder for washing clothes, hair, bodies and, most especially, woolens. The soap is known to be particuarly good for cleaning animal fiber and has the added virtue of repelling moths and other insects. Plus it’s hypoallergenic. Apparently they are now being imported and sold in the west in natural food and housewares stores at a premium price. Here they are what the old women use who don’t want to spend the money on, or don’t see the point of using, commercial washing powders. Soap on trees that’s good for your sweaters and your hair. What will Mother Nature think of next?