Practically all the employees misplaced their homes, the accountant and vet disappeared together with their households, however after the lethal earthquake that devastated Turkey’s Hatay province, “the silk of peace” helps make new connections.
“I needed to persuade myself to start out up once more,” admits Emel Duman, rolling between her fingers a small and extremely effective ball of fibres.
The yellow cocoons, with which she spins and weaves pure silk, have been her life’s venture.
Duman’s residence was destroyed within the February catastrophe and he or she lives along with her household in a silk cooperative workshop on the heights overlooking Antakya.
Following the quake, about 100 individuals who had misplaced every little thing crammed into the constructing for shelter.
That they had survived however at the least 50,000 folks died in southern Turkey.
“Aside from the workshop, every little thing collapsed. It is troublesome to start out over,” says the 57-year-old.
Seventy folks had been employed by the Appollon cooperative, principally girls usually working from residence.
Solely a handful have come again, together with the designer who had already moved in to dwell.
When Duman had first began the enterprise 25 years earlier than, Hatay — on one of many silk routes of antiquity — had misplaced the refined manufacturing expertise. Weaving continued however with white cocoons imported from China.
– Yellow cocoon –
Hatay’s particular cocoon is yellowish and Duman obsessively tracked down the final place breeding the bombyx mori home silk moth across the metropolis of Antakya.
Her husband, Fikret, says she talks to the bugs.
“It is like with plant species, it’s a must to combat towards the lack of biodiversity,” she says.
On dry and rocky land Fikret and Emel planted their first mulberry bushes, fragile crops which want watering day and evening. The couple had water introduced in by truck till a effectively was sunk.
Right now, the 15,000 bushes nourish 1000’s of white worms, stored within the shade on massive wood platforms. Should you pay attention fastidiously, you’ll be able to hear the worms munching the contemporary mulberry leaves.
“It is an orchestral symphony, probably the most lovely music on this planet,” says Fikret after spreading out extra freshly-picked leaves.
Emel lets nature do its work. The silkworm egg hatches a caterpillar which ultimately pierces a gap by way of the cocoon it has spun and flutters off as a moth.
Working with sericulture or silk manufacturing specialists from Hatay’s Mustafa Kemal college and from Izmir, Duman heard of “the silk of peace”, or ahimsa silk, an Indian time period for silk produced with out ache.
“Industrial (manufacturing) boils the cocoon to kill the worm,” she explains.
On the cooperative every cocoon is stretched out to a thread of as much as 1,700 metres of silk, says her 32-year-old daughter Tugce, who studied textiles and design.
“However all of it can’t be used due to the outlet which damages the filament.”
– Marriage trousseau –
Silk manufacturing steadily declined in Hatay after the tip of the Ottoman Empire within the early twentieth century.
Emel recollects how brides would historically obtain a silk trousseau for his or her marriage.
She misplaced nephews and cousins to the quake that was “so sturdy I assumed nobody had survived” and was then caught up serving to households who wanted support.
However Emel struggled on to kickstart silk manufacturing once more.
She discovered her personal assist from The Worldwide Group for Migration which despatched Syrian refugees to work at Appollon.
Now Emel is searching for official recognition for the “peace silk of Hatay” and has filed for a protected designation of origin.
About 350,000 folks labored in 3,000 clothes and textile companies within the provinces hit by the February 6 earthquake.
Right now, the numbers have been halved, in accordance with the United Nations Growth Programme (UNDP), which is operating a marketing campaign to recruit girls.
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