Filming in Nyaung Pin Zauk

 We left Bagan running the gauntlet of dozens of boys with water hoses trained in our direction. Sebastian drew in his camera and closed the window – pronto! Sadly we could not give away presents of fruit, cake, toothbrushes and paste (from the hotel!) to the children of the villages through which we passed, for fear that we’d get a bucket or two full of water in the car. The Water Festival lasts for five days so we must take precautions until the sixth.

We arrived at Nyaung Pin Zauk. The first photos illustrate an oil extraction venture that one of the recipients of Gifts of Sight had to turn to when her eyes were too bad for her to weave.

Everyone was in their best clothes in honour of Sebastian who started filming even before Win San parked the car. The plan was that Sebastian would go off to film with Win San as his assistant to do the microphone and of course the translation.  Meanwhile, Saya Htay and I would give away glasses to all who needed them. The last time we were here, in January, we could give only to the north end of the village. Now we have time (and glasses) to give away to the south end.

Sebastian is making a film, which will last for half an hour. Within that time he wanted five stories from five different people in Nyaung Pin Zauk to whom we have previously given glasses, to see if they have helped them.

We identified a weaver, a bamboo cutter, a toddy tapper, a concrete pot maker and a basket maker. Sebastian wanted answers to five or six questions for example:

How and how long ago did they know their eyesight was failing. Did they have to stop doing their job. If yes, how long ago was this. After you received the Gifts of Sight glasses. Did the glasses help you? Could you start your old job again?

All the glasses we gave away today were from Rotary Langkawi. They were glasses ordered and paid for by tourists who then did not pick them up. Very generously on hearing about our Gifts of Sight project the optician in Langkawi gave them to Rotary, Rotary gave them to me and we gave them to the south end of Nyaung Pin Zauk. Because the glasses were all new and bi-focal or multi focal Saya Htay warned the recipients to be careful at first until they got used to being able to see in different ways.

Our first ‘client’ was Daw Mee Mye who was 40 years of age and a weaver. She noticed her eyes were getting cloudy more than ten years ago. She needed more and more help and her very young grandson did the bobbin winding and tied the knots every time she came to the end of a bobbin. Her weaving slowed right down and was not of the same standard as before, but the growing family needed money so she started a peanut oil business. She has a small diesel generator and two machines one to crush the peanuts the other to squeeze out the oil. It takes an hour to reduce peanuts to peanut oil and she can sell the oil at Kyat 2,500 (US$2) for one litre. But her real love was weaving she told us and when we had finished admiring the peanut oil venture we walked back to her loom.

Her husband came to see us on his way to work. He is a farmer of peanuts, beans and sesame, because this is what grows best in the hot dry land around here. He showed us his paso and eingyi (sarong and shirt) both woven by his wife, as well as the very dilapidated cap he was wearing which had seen much service! A small boy arrived carrying many skeins of cotton: purple, blue and black, he got together with his grandmother to fill bobbin after bobbin. Daw Mee Mye’s daughter has to concentrate on the peanut oil, so it is very helpful to have the grandson wanting and able to help.

We are staying at the Golden Palace in Pakokku with is comfortable and has electricity but the speed of the internet is glacial and I would have to stay here a week to post pictures on my blog. I will, therefore, send some photos of the people wearing Rotary Langkawi's glasses by Dropbox to David Bradley. Others I will post on Facebook which is slightly faster.