"PATTERNED BANDS" IN THE N.T. OF HONG KONG
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cut grass for fuel, carried firewood, and farmed. The housework and cooking were done by my mother-in-law, who also helped me in the fields. After she died, I took over all the responsibilities myself. No men helped me with the farm work, and we did not have the money to hire labourers. I did the plowing myself, even with a baby on my back. I cut grass and sold the grass and vegetables. I worked and struggled hard. I also worked for the Texaco company carrying steel and kerosene. In the evenings I wove patterned bands. I could weave one in two or three nights, but I never had time during the day.
Other women stated that they had worked at weaving patterned bands in the evenings when they had time, during bad weather and the agricultural slack season, and at festivals.
Girls learned to weave the bands while in their teens. They were taught by their mothers or by other village women. They wove bands for their own use, as well as for those friends and lineage sisters who were unable to learn the complex technique. They were sometimes even woven for sale.
The technique of weaving patterned bands is complex and difficult to learn, although the loom itself is extremely simple, with no frame. It would not doubt take some years for girls to learn well, when they were doing other work in addition. Those who became good weavers were able to imitate patterns on sight, and to devise their own patterns.
The bands are woven on a simple backstrap loom: see Plate 1.* The warp is a continuous circle, one end of which passes over the corner of an ordinary square wooden stool, the other end being fastened to a belt which is tied around the weaver's waist. The warp is held taut by the distance which she sits from the stool, on another stool. The weaver prepares the warp by winding a series of circles, half the length of a finished band in diameter, between a finger of her left hand and the corner of the stool, holding the thread taut at all times. If the warp is to have, for example, red even threads () and white odd threads (*), she carefully winds nine pairs of red circles, then ties white thread to the end of the red and winds nine pairs of white circles. If the edges (i) of the band are to be narrow stripes of different colours, she might then wind four pairs each of red, yellow, and green. After tying the ends of the threads so that a continuous circle is formed, she then inserts
* Plates 1 - 14 illustrate this article.