Silk City

October 25, 2024

This p-day was a bit up-in-the-air, as it was transfer week: we sent 5 missionaries home Tuesday and we welcomed 14 newbies yesterday. That meant the missionaries were displaced if they lost a companion, and displaced if they were gaining a new companion, and left Allen and I to wander on our own. Not a problem!

The biggest problem we faced--aside from where to go this week--was the threat of rain, which became more than just a threat as soon as we decided it was time to go. It poured for the 5 minutes before we got in the car, but stopped long enough to make us feel all sure of ourselves. And when we arrived... well, I'll get to that.

This day we chose to go to a place that makes silk that is shipped all over the world and is greatly valued in places like France. It's a relatively small place in Hanoi called Silk City, or Van Phuc. It is the best-known silk village in Vietnam and is one of the oldest.

As we arrived, the raindrops began to fall and as the Grab car drove away and we walked down the first street, the raindrops let us know they weren't kidding. We've been told that in Hanoi the rain can be like a faucet that turns on all at once. Yup.

We hurried over an arched wooden bridge and discovered how slippery wet wooden bridges can be, and how slippery wet slimy tile sidewalks can be. We were able to shelter under an arched building right by a shrine to wait out the sky water.

The rain finally stopped and let us move, and we walked past some smaller shrines to the main street. The first interesting door we passed had a brightly colored wall, and the old man at the far end of the courtyard beckoned for us to come back and go in the workshop. It was FASCINATING.

There were a few looms in this workshop, each one busily clacking and weaving silk.

The line of cards you see at the top are like the old punch-cards in computer programming, and they tell the machine what the pattern will be in the silk.

It was amazing to see those looms weave the silk, and also the spools of thread that were fed into the looms.

And from the workshop, the old gentleman showed us the door to the store where he hoped we would purchase some of their beautiful silk products.

As we left, we saw the beginnings of the entire silk process--the cocoons.

It's hard to believe that the beautiful silk dresses we saw began like that!

We left that first shop and walked up and down streets that were lined with dozens of different silk shops, and there were so many beautiful dresses, silk hats, silk artwork, silk clothing of every kind... It was amazing.

I had to include the picture on the right just so I could get the tag with the size on the red dress--XL. Really? It's no wonder I wear a 3XL!

One of the main streets in Silk City is open to traffic, but is made to be a part of the decorations.

These people were stitching together the silk pattern for the looms.

We found another workshop that was filled with looms! And then we understood how this place could make so much silk!

We found another temple/shrine:

And more silk shops and courtyards and interesting places:

When we finally left Silk City, we walked along the street out in the "real" world and quickly found something we needed: (modeling it back in the apartment)

We walked a little way down the road to another interesting bridge, this one made of bricks, so not too old.

And more marketplaces...

We did take some interesting pictures of some of the meat being prepared for purchase, but as they formerly said "woof, woof", I decided not to show the pictures. If you want to see them, you can message me.

On the way home, we saw an interesting cell tower(?) that looked much better than fake pine trees!