The final week

Lemon Rice

Sorry that this post is so delayed in coming.

We have just completed our last week of training with the ladies and it was a really wonderful one.

We had left them a small practise order to complete while we were away for a week & we returned to find it all made beautifully and to find them beaming with pride at having done it.

It is really noticeable that suddenly they have turned a corner & all the training has suddenly clicked and they are very competently making everything (even the earring hooks!), with little need for any direction. 

Something I have realised whilst teaching them is that the real skill in a craft is being able to know how to correct a mistake, how a simple nick of the pliers in the right place can straighten a kink and in being able to make judgments on which tool available is best to use to produce or make a certain shape or piece.  I am being to see glimpses of these levels of skills, which is an amazing achievement for them with just four weeks of training.

At least two of the women (we have had between 7 & 10 on most days) have found a real passion in jewellery making and it is an amazing feeling to have been able to give them that. 

One of the younger girls, who lives at the children’s and women’s hostel on the farm (on which the production unit also sits & is a part of) previously had a really hard time at school and so after a series of sad events she decided to leave (she is 16) and began work at the production unit.  Although she really enjoyed working there as an alternative to learning at school, she didn’t particularly take to sewing (which is what the women’s work has previously consisted entirely of) but right from the start of our training she has been so eager to learn and more importantly, to practise.  At the start she often became frustrated with not being able to accomplish things immediately but over the last two months, through our training and her commitment, she has become very skilled and still seems to absolutely adore completing a necklace and slipping it around her neck.  The change in her attitude to working at the unit is really visible and she is really vocal about being so happy at being able to make jewellery.

There are two ‘teachers’ at the Production Unit who are effectively in charge of the others and have responsibilities for organising the orders & distributing the work, as well as keeping the younger ones in check (which they seem to have found the hammers that we have introduced for jewellery making also useful for!).  They are paid a little more then the others for this (the responsibilities, not the threatening). 

Geeta, one of the teachers, has gradually taken on the role of being in charge of the jewellery side of things.  Whilst we are away she has encouraged the others to practise and develop their skills, and through this has become very skilled.

We really couldn’t have achieved so much without her quiet focus & attention to detail, coupled with, at times, her suddenly booming voice shouting at the others in Tamil to stop talking and continue working!

Even without being able to converse easily it is clear that she has really enjoyed our company, the chance to learn a new skill and the luxury of time to become so passionate about jewellery.  This week she worked out how to make a bangle, which I just couldn’t get my head around – her pride and sense of achievement when she realised what she had done was tangible.  She barely smiles so her smile then was all the more worth it.

One morning this week she brought us lemon rice, light and fresh, dotted with peanuts, soft bay leaves & a little chilli, packed in a layered tiffin and still warm to touch, like tasty hot water bottle.   Accompanied with fried wadas, spicy chickpea cakes (a little like falafel), wrapped in newspaper and bound with string to keep it together, the grease and the smell of spices seeping through the paper, almost designed to entice and make the mouth water. 

She had taken the time to make us this despite her arising at 4 o’clock, having gone to bed at only 11pm or 12 midnight.  She stays awake late, making cholis, the tight blouse worn under a sari and sewing clothes for her family, and encouraging her children to study late.  Rising in the dark of the morning, or middle of the night as I am accustomed to it being, she does the washing, all by hand of course, cooks food for breakfast and the packed lunches for the day and cleans her house.  Before walking to meet the bus that goes from the production unit to collect the ladies to bring them to work.  This is her daily routine.   Never again will I take a washing machine for granted – I can’t believe how much of a difference the initial invention of the washing machine must have made to women!  But of course here, even if it was an affordable amenity, the often scarcity of water (if it is available running close to the house rather than a common well) and the expense and unreliability of electrical power means that the luxury of a having a washing machine is along way off for all of the women here.

We have left the ladies with beads and materials to be able to make some jewellery for themselves and for the 50 or so children living at the hostel, they are delighted to be able to make them all a piece of jewellery for Christmas and they set about developing new designs for rings and for earrings more suitable to the Indian taste!  Although they are very pleased with most of the designs we have developed with them, the nature of the project means that the jewellery has to be marketable in the UK and so some styles they find amusing rather than liking them!

Geeta set about cutting out hearts from brass sheet, for pendants, and punching in letters.  She presented them to us with ‘Grace’ & ‘Lottie’ written on each prospective heart – it has become my pride possession.

We have now left them with a larger order of all the samples to complete before we go back for two days at the beginning of December to collect it, deliver last minute materials and sweets to keep them going and to say goodbye.

We both feel that after the success of this week we can now dare to hope that this can, and will, continue productively and successfully when we are back in the UK….still our fingers are crossed.

Photographs from Week Three

Monday 18th October

We spent a slightly limbo week in Bangalore, there is always much that we want to get done but everything does seem to take such a long time.  Either through getting across the city (Bangalore is about the size of London but seems even bigger when you really don’t know your way around…and neither does the rickshaw driver that is taking you!), or placing orders in broken English/Tamil/Hindi/Kannada on the phone only to have to start again and wait when you get there!  The Indian’s that we meet certainly do work hard, but in a different way to we are used to in the UK, they think nothing of waiting, so are happy to make you wait (which can be frustrating) but equally happy to wait as long as you need to make a decision or twenty…which is amazing for me as decisions are not my strong point - particularly when it comes to colours or choices of amazingly beautiful beads or fabrics.  

Men staff most of the shops here and I love the way they flourish the fabrics open on the table, or pinpoint the most minute details in the cloth, or notice the subtle differences in the colours of stones or beads.  They seem here to have such an outstanding eye for aesthetic detail that is ingrained that I have never noticed so much elsewhere…although I can’t say have ever done so much shopping for materials of all kinds so maybe I would find the same at home.

So we have been sourcing yet more materials and dodging the closures for Hindu festivals (it is well and truly festival season at the moment) to be able to buy more of the same that we need for developing more samples here, developing ideas for packaging and meeting with a graphic designer who should be able to help us through the task of conversing with the printers.  She is India and she too voiced her frustration at trying to get anything done, so it isn’t just a cultural difference.

It is amazing to be given the opportunity to work here, I feel very fortunate to be able to see this side of life in India.  It also has made me realise just how difficult working across cultural boundaries can be.  How could I just have expected to come here, knowing so little of the country and it’s people, and expecting everything to work like clockwork…?  Blind optimism seems to get you a long way!

We are now once again, back in the welcome tranquillity of the project.

We returned with a bag of toffees for the ladies that cost us 170 Rupees, shamefully we hadn’t batted an eyelid at this but they couldn’t believe how that we had spent that much on sweets!  They are enjoying them all the same, or more so perhaps.

The ladies are happy, well & busy.  This area of Tamil Nadu is baking in un-seasonally hot & sunshiny weather.   Although this can make working in a building with a tin roof sweltering, particularly when the power (and therefore fan) is off between the scheduled times of 4 & 6pm, it is making Lottie happy as she says that finally the light is better for her photographs.  (I think they are beautiful already - more to follow when we get back to full internet on Friday.)

Tonight our chapatis for supper were kept warn by David Cameron & Alister Darling - they had been wrapped in a copy of the Financial Times with a photo of them perfectly situated on the top!

Buying Silver - Written Thursday 14th October

As, I am informed, you are enjoying an Indian Summer, today we are enjoying a South India Autumn – the air feels think with muggy heat, trapped by the looming grey thunder clouds of the monsoon that have, until now, been lurking in the almost distance & looking fit to burst under the strain of their heavy load, like the muscles of many a worker we have seen lifting sacks upon sacks of rice from cart to store, his face contorted with pain.  When they finally break & the rain comes tumbling down, the cloud fresh clean water immediately contaminated filthy grey as it pounds harder and harder in an attempt to wash clean the cities broken pavements.

When we were collecting the silver wire we had ordered, the downpour held us hostage in the shop – a single room, with no sign above the door to hint at it’s purpose, painted blue, always blue, for no other reason than it is a colour that complements every other, welcoming & brightening the simplicity & frugality of the houses, stores & carts that it adorns.  An open furnace around which a man or two in bare feet crouches teasing the metal, stacks of disposable terracotta pots (which will surely one day become a sort after, with the growing use of plastic instead), and a large safe is all that this thriving business requires.

Enquiring after the whether they make gold wire, the owner retrieved an ingot of 24 ct gold from the safe and offered it out to me.  I held out my left hand to take it but he motioned to me to use my right.  I felt very rude as of course here the left hand is only used for going to the toilet.

As we sat in the large open doorway, waiting for the gate of rain to let us leave, the gold-smelter’s grandson folded origami boats and threw them out onto the ever-expanding torrent of water between the shop front and the parking of motorcycles in the narrow road.  Most sank, sodden & drowned quickly by the giant drops, one succeeded, racing down the river Gutter, navigating floating chai cups and street debris, and disappeared out of sight.  

Daily working life

Another week has flown by we have finished the second week of training with the ladies.  It has been a pleasure to spend another week with them.  They are so joyful & kind - bringing us custard apples as gifts in the morning - like an apple for the teacher, and are continually amused by our attempts at learning Tamil...consisting mainly of words for jewellery tools and terms, such as beads is money, & wire is cambi.

The women's working day here at the production unit begins at 9.30am, they come from both the hostel here on the farm at MAT, and from the scattered surrounding villages. They have mostly done a days work before beginning - washing, cooking & cleaning for their families, or doing duties on the farm & helping care for the children at the orphanage, also here at MAT. 

They work leisurely but methodically throughout the day, laughing, giggling and teasing each other constantly!  There is a really supportive atmosphere & they all seem to really enjoy coming to work alongside their friends (sisters, as they call us).  They enjoy snacks and sweets that they bring to share with everybody.  They work in bare feet (which has proved a little hazardous with shards of metal littering the floor!), mainly sitting on mats on the floor to sew.

They break for lunch sabre at 1.00, eating outside in amongst potted plants that they have placed around the front of the production unit.  They bring rice & dahl or curry gravy in stainless steel tiffin boxes, wrapped in fabric or carried in baskets. 


Immediately around the unit lie paddy fields, vines growing bitter gourds & thousands of peanut plants.  Small thatched shacks house chickens and a couple of pretty vicious turkeys!  There is no toilet in the unit so the ladies disappear in ones or twos in amongst all the greenery...their saris are perfect for them to be able to do this discretely, albeit the squats of delicious colours glowing from a distance in the complimentary vibrant green vegetation...our trousers, however, are not so designed and I am sure we flash a white bum to the surrounding farm workers whenever we need to go!


The ladies finish at 5.00, sweeping up all the off cuts and threads with pointy hand brooms, rolling up the mats & closing all the windows.  Whilst working after they had finished one night this week, Lottie spotted a cheeky chipmonk sneaking into the building through a broken window and running (for his life, when he realise he wasn't alone) across the main room and into the small room that houses all the spare fabric.  We surmised that it would make a very comfy nest for little chipmonk babies & so had to draw pictures of the creature to be able to explain to the ladies of the new inhabitant - we didn't know the Tamil for chipmonk!

Week Two Photographs

Peanuts drying in the sun

Grace with the new arrivals!

The Production Unit

Peanut picking