Silk Factory and Week 2 Summary

Sawasdee khràp everyone,

    We have reached the half-way point through our APPE in Thailand.  It has been a very amazing experience.  We have seen and done so much in just a little bit of time from all the different hospitals we visit in Bangkok to the various street markets/street food.  I am incredibly thankful for this opportunity and experience.  There is so much history and culture seaped in the landscape, where ever you turn your head you seen sights that delight and surprise you.

     On Sunday we visited Wat Phra That Doi Suthep.  A picturesque sacred temple up high in the mountains.  The drive up the mountain was full of twist and turns as the road snaked up the mountain.  I was amazed at the drivers and the people biking and walking up the mountain.  Once we reached the base of the temple, there was a grand stairway that you could walk to the temple.  The stairs were flanked by two beautiful snakes with five heads that ungulated up the mountain.  The detail there was incredibly fine.  It was truly breathtaking.  The cool marble felt really nice to walk on I have included a few photos from the temple to show you.  It was truly beautiful and felt very peaceful.  

     Next, we went to a few workshops to see how the Thai make various things like sun umbrellas and silk.  Other members of our group have posted about the umbrella factory and I highly recommend their posts about the subject.  The silk factory was wonderful.  There was a short tour of the process by which silk is harvested.  There they showed how the silkworms grow by eating the leaves of the mulberry.  The also showed the life cycle of the silkworm how forms a cocoon of the silk strand and the process by which the silk is extracted.  The silk is what makes up the cocoon of the silkworm right before it matures to adulthood.  Once the cocoon is formed the silk makers will throw 50-60 cocoons into a pot of boiling water which kills the silkworm and makes extracting the whole continuous silk strand much easier.  If the silkworm was to grow to adulthood the cocoon would not be able to produce a single strand.  The person extracting the silk uses a wooden fork-like object and continuously swirls that around gathering all the strands together where it is spun producing a single strand of strong silk.  This is raw silk and feels much different from the refined silk that is treated with dyes and other chemicals.  After that, we watched two women who were weaving sheets of silk and how quickly they were able to work.  Our guide told us the women can weave about 4 meters (13 feet roughly) in 7 hours  I am grateful for this experience. 

     It was incredible to see the artistry that goes into making raw silk and seeing all of the various products that can be made of silk.    I really enjoyed seeing the whole process and especially touching all the silk.  I have included a photo of the silk factory and two photos showing the silkworms busy eating away and the cocoons that the silkworm was allowed to mature resulting in holes in the cocoon.

As always Thank you for reading!

-IM