Lesson 4: Blacksmith's tools and nostalgia

(Baonghean)-The life of the highlanders is closely linked to the fields and ridges, so the agricultural tools of this profession are quite diverse, such as tools for sowing seeds, weeding, harvesting rice, and are still very necessary for the lives of people in areas where rice is still grown on the ridges...

She said: "My family planted the rice late so the villagers celebrated the new rice before going to cut it." I followed her to the field because I wanted to see how to use the sickle, a tool with a blade as small as a pocket knife, attached to a wooden frame. This tool can be held in the palm of the hand, helping people pick each rice flower. Cutting upland rice with a sickle will not be fast because the upland rice plants do not grow evenly like when transplanted in the field. Besides, picking each flower makes the bundle of rice look more beautiful. In my hometown, people have not used this tool since the ban on slash-and-burn cultivation, which has been over 20 years.

Cutting rice with a sickle

Being a "9x" generation, her friends all went to work in the North and the South, but Ms. Van remained faithful to the fields in her village. According to her, no matter where they went, they would eventually return to their village. Not passing the university entrance exam, she decided to stay home and work with her parents. Nowadays, a village girl like her is really rare.

Ms. Van talked about the job of tilling enthusiastically, seemingly unaware that I had also spent my childhood in the fields: "Working on the fields requires many tools, the hep is just one of them." That was the introduction to the story about the tools for tilling, although it was not unfamiliar to me. When the fields are cleared, the work of the knife is over. The Thai people's knives are usually forged by the Kinh people, only a small number of Thai people know the craft of forging. Unlike the Mong people, they can forge knives that are both sharp and hard. After the fields are cleared, they can be dried in the sun for about a week before being burned for sowing rice. Now, it is time for the chi le, a tool for sowing rice and corn, made from a blunt knife inserted into a long handle used to poke holes for sowing seeds. However, there are also people who are more elaborate, the old knife is reforged to be sharper, the handle is carefully made, durable and beautiful, and can be used through many sowing seasons. In the past, when people did not know how to use this tool, they used a sharp stick (ch'lum) to poke holes for seeds, which was both easy to damage and labor-intensive, with productivity only half that of using a single thread. Those who were passionate about sowing also wove a ca dang (a basket) and wore it on their chest to hold the rice seeds. When they had sown a handful, they would reach out to scoop up the seeds, which were not stored in the phac pa (a tool used by women in the highlands to hold a jungle knife). The phac pa is smaller than the ca dang (a basket) and can hold fewer seeds, and is often worn on the back, making it quite inconvenient when sowing rice.

The rice weeding season is when the weeding tool comes into play. It is used instead of a hoe, but is more compact, so as not to break or cut the young rice plants. The weeding tool is forged like a jungle knife, bent into a right angle, with a sharp blade to cut grass. Therefore, sometimes people also take advantage of a blunt knife, bend it, and sharpen it into a weeding tool.

The narrow and narrowpick a rice flower

Mr. Vi Van Doan, resident of Mon village (Thach Giam - Tuong Duong), who is quite proficient in blacksmithing and weaving, said: Forging agricultural tools is not a difficult thing. People still use the wooden saw blades of abandoned forest workers to forge saws, and use broken iron bars from old cars to forge tools for sowing seeds and weeding rice. But the most popular "material" for forging agricultural tools of the Thai people is still the remaining war bombs. This type of steel is difficult to forge, requires a lot of effort but is very sharp and durable, some can be used for dozens of farming seasons.

Mr. Doan shared: "The Thai people's farming tools now are all bought from Kinh blacksmiths. They can be bought at the market, they are cheap and readily available, so the locals are gradually becoming lazy and moving away from the traditional blacksmithing profession!". Another reason is that the traditional bellows and forges often take a lot of time, sometimes it takes several days to forge a knife to go to the forest. Maybe that's why the locals are gradually moving away from the blacksmithing profession...

Mr. Doan confided: Sometimes he still misses the blacksmithing profession. He wants to blow the bellows but after a long time, it has become cold. However, every now and then he blows the bellows to forge a few bellows for his daughter-in-law and son to cut rice so he won't forget the profession!

Article and photos:You Wei