26/11

Remembering 26/11

The day..26th of November 2008 ...can any Indian forget? All of us still remember the events as if it just happened yesterday. Terrorist attacks in Mumbai killing so many people and officers, the whole nation in fact the whole world watched the horror..we just could not sleep. All of my family friends, relatives, colleagues, neighbors were glued to our TV sets and  just watched through the horrific incidents unfolding in front of our eyes.

Unbelievable, agitated, frustrated, angered and what else? There are no words to descibe our feelings at that time. Even today, its a wound not healed.

May the souls of all those who lost their lives during the events rest in peace. Some of our best officers lost their lives fighting for the country on that day. May their souls rest in peace and May God give the stregth to their families in coping up with their losses.

My family, friends and relatives have assembled at my place to pray for all those people who lost their lives or lost their kith, kin or friends and are grieving.

In this hour we need to join hands across the various barriers of caste, creed, race, culture, languages, and countries and any other differences to stay united and pray for peace and happiness. We are all humans and thus ONE. We have a right to happiness and peace. Say NO to Violence be it any type, NO to Discrimination being any type and NO to Terrorism.  Let us all resolve our petty differences, being God's creation and stay together. We Indians believe in Vasudaiva Kutumbikam ie Universal family...after all world is but a huge family......

There are so many other issues like poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition, diseases, pollution, saving our planet and so many more against which we have to fight. Why waste our time, energies and precious resources in all other petty issues?

Let us join hands to make this planet a beautiful place to live in...just by doing what ever little we can every day every second....be it a small word of kindness..a small hand stretched forward to help the down trodden......a little smile to gladden a heart which is grieving, a little pat on the back ..a finger to wipe away the tears..a hug....just a little.... just a second ....but it can make a BIG difference....

BATIK

Batik is a traditional dyeing technique. Wax is used to resist the colour(s) to form the design. Its quite laborious. But history reveals that there were proofs of using this technique by Egyptians as early as 4th century BC to produce cloth for wrapping mummies. This art is found in Java Indonesia, Malaysia, China Japan, India and Africa. But the most popular ones are from Java.

The word "Batik" is said to originate from Java. It is pronounced as "Bateek". It means written with wax.

The procedure involves use of hot wax. One has to work very quickly and efficiently since the wax keeps on solidifying.

But the beauty in this art depends on the fact that one need not be a great artist. Just  basic skills of drawing or sketching can be enough. First planning and making a sketch and then using the design is ok, but then many a time just being spontaneous produces some beautiful pieces.

Generally natural fabrics like pure cotton or silk cloth is used. Any natural fiber like jute or linen are also fine. The synthetic ones wont dye properly. The finer the cloth, the intricate the design. But silks are expensive and difficult to handle for the beginners. Fine cottons are there fore extensively used.

A mixture of Bee wax and Paraffin wax is used. Bee wax has the tendency to seep into the cloth thereby attaching itself to the cloth. Paraffin wax is very brittle and cracks easily, helps in producing the crackling effect for which the Batik so famous for. An ideal mix would be 30: 70, but it can be varied to suit the design and the effect.

The cloth is fixed to a frame to keep it taut. After tracing the design, hot wax is applied with brush in those areas where the colour to be dyed is not required. Once the areas in the design are filled, the cloth is wrinkled to produce the crackling effect. Then it is dyed, obviously in cold dyes as hot ones melt the wax. Once dipped in dye, its not squeezed but let to dry naturally. This process of applying wax in unwanted areas and dyeing is continued till required design is got. Then its is dipped in hot water to get rid of the wax.

In India, West Bengal is very famous for its Batiks. Wall hangings, bedsheets, pillow cases, dresses made out of these materials and especially saris and blouses are quite famous. Sometime ago I visited one of the exhibitions conducted by our textile ministry and happened to pick up some Batik blouses. I also have some saris, but need to photograph them. I just cant resist a beautiful Batik. These two here are blouses.

See this combination of green and black. this design is on the sleeves.

Here see the design on the neck. So beautiful.

This is a dark purple, and design is on the neck line.

These are the sleeves.

This one here is a long kurtha or tunic with mirror work. See the paisley design.

PATCH WORK

We all know what patch work is. Especially those doing quilts know much more than me. In India too patch work has been used traditionally for long. But today I am not touching that.

Today I am only talking about the contemporary patch work, that's been storming the Indian fashion scene. Especially Saris are being adorned with various patch work. The patches are added using machine stitching. Ofcourse attaching by hand is time consuming for a six meters Sari. Now the simplest form is adding patches in different shapes like flowers, squares, circles, triangles and so on. The patches can be plain or printed.

But the creative minds add embellishment on the patches. It could be a simple embroidery using floss- running stitch, back stitch, herring bone and chain etc. Even the floss used could be ordinary cotton or silk, metallic threads or the coloured thread with gold in it.

Apart from this, kundans, coins, beads, mirrors and many such things are used to highlight the patches. I will share with you some of them here, as I dint have much time to photograph my saris. So will do them one by one as time permits:

Here is a sari I bought when I went to visit my cousins a few months back. Here I loved the combination of white and red. There was also white with black combination. But it was not as dramatic as this. A printed cloth has been used for the patches. The patches are square in shape. Interestingly the patches are surrounded by block prints.

This is the Pallu. A number of patches are used here as it can be quite clearly seen when that part is draped over the shoulder You can see the block printed border below the patches.

Here you can see the ribbon sized patch on both the edges of the sari along with the block printed design.

Here you can see the blouse made of matching printed material. I love this sari for its dramatic combination. The sari is made of cotton material and is good any time but more so in summer when the temperatures soar.

So how do you like it? Its very simple but elegant....