Post by Laoupdate on Jan 24, 2005 4:15:52 GMT -5
Lao skirts play important role
LAO women have been weaving the skirt known as the Sinh for a very long time. The weavers do not usually have little chance to go to school. They usually can't read or write. However, everybody who sees the weaving is amazed at its beauty. Tourists like to touch, buy and wear the skirts. This means the weavers should be very proud of what they do.
However, the Vientiane Mai newspaper says it is worried about the lessening of wearing of the sinh by the younger generation. Like other traditional things, they are becoming rarer. The appreciation by the younger does not match the appreciation of foreigners, who say they would like to own aa wide range of our products, because the Lao sinhs are very beautiful.
A researcher and traditional pattern clothes collector, Mrs Duangdueng Bounyavong, told the newspaper that she once went to a meeting in Thailand. She had the chance to visit the home of another traditional pattern clothes collector and was very surprised to see that most traditional clothes and patterns there came from Laos, especially from the northern provinces. She also once saw foreigners taking a dozen suitcases of ancient silks and traditional sinhs back home. She said beged them not to, saying that if they cared for and loved Laos as well as its people, they would realise that Laos would never see those beautiful sinhs again. The harm about this is that many Lao women use the ancient sinhs as patterns for weaving and producing more sinhs. Laos does not have a weaving school.
The Vientiane Mai newspaper said that everybody who sees them, falls in love with them, but why do some Lao women overlook our traditional cultural property. The writer said that the previous week he went to a baci ceremony and saw some women wearing pants and short skirts instead of Lao traditional skirts (sinhs). The writer said he would like to ask whether that was suitable and proper.
Some answer that making Lao women wear sinhs is an out-of-date idea because we talk about personal independence and there is no law which forces Lao women to wear sinhs.
A Diethem Tourism Company official, Ms Sivone, explained that the idea that they do not have to wear sinhs is not correct, since people should understand clearly the difference between controlling people by law and protecting Lao culture. Lao women and sinhs have been related to each other in mind and practical terms for a long time, because ever since females were born, their mothers have used sinhs to cover them. The mothers teach them to wear sinhs and when they grow up, they do it for themselves and pass it on from generation to generation.
-Vientiane Mai Newspaper, January 12.
Source: vientianetimes.org.la
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