On a crisp, cool day in southern China we follow a woman from the local Bai ethnic minority through the backstreets of Xizhou Township. After meeting us in the local marketplace, she leads us to her courtyard home, where we enter through a crowded workroom piled high with folded cloth, and emerge into a sunny inner courtyard space. We duck under drying lines laden with deep blue, dripping fabric.
The Bai people are descendants of the ancient Ji who inhabited the Huangshui River area about 2,200 years ago. Today the Bai population of 1,858,000 live in four provinces – Yunnan, Guishou, Sichuan and Hunan.
The Bai have an almost 2000 year history of textile making, and their clothing today is distinctive, bright, delicately embroidered, often with camellia flowers which they love as a symbol of beauty. The colourful head-scarfs that the women wear represent a blooming camellia flower, and are called ‘the flower in the wind and the moon on a snowy night'. White is their favourite color which they believe represents dignity and high social status - men typically wear white trousers and outer garments, and women wear white, light blue or pink with colourful waistcoats. Unmarried women and girls wear their hair in a coiled plait wound around their head and secured with a bright red wool headband.
In the courtyard we watch as our hostess shows us the steps in the process of the ancient Bai art of Batik. She shows us how the raw white cloth – once hand-loomed but now factory made – is laid flat and an intricate wax design is drawn on by hand. Each cloth piece is then tightly tied with knots following one of many traditional patterns. The knots are then stitched in place, a painstaking process. The cloth is then soaked in a large vat of deep blue liquid dye, made with herbs grown in their small courtyard garden – banlangen herb and indigo – she plucks a few and shows us the deep blue underside of the indigo leaves from which the dye is extracted. These natural dyes are less prone to fading and are gentle on the skin. The cloth is washed in clear water and returned to the dye vat numerous times until the deep blue colour is achieved, then hung to dry in the sun. Inside the workroom an elderly male relative unknots the fabric and removes the stitching, revealing the intricate white pattern remaining on the blue cloth.
Paul McIlwain is a Travel Writer, and member of The International Travel Writers Alliance. Paul McIlwain and Linda McIlwain also author the Travel Blog GullyandRoad.
Mea Asia - About the Author:
Paul McIlwain is a Travel Writer, and member of The International Travel Writers Alliance. Paul McIlwain and Linda McIlwain also author the Travel Blog gullyandroad.com. For more information, see Paul McIlwain's professional profile at: http://au.linkedin.com/in/paulmcilwain.
