Monday, March 12, 2007

Sweat. Shopping.

Hoi An! Old town, tiny streets, ancient charm. Warm climate. A tiny town containing over 200 tailor shops. A long time ago, Hoi An was a silk trade port into and out of China. Over the years, the town has become known worldwide in their knack for producing quality clothing out of such traditional fabrics as silk, rayon and polyester. Nearly every storefront has dresses, shoes and suits, sometimes displaying fashions that are woefully out of date. Heavy overcoats that would never be able to be worn in such tropical climates are apparently very popular.

Heading into the stores, two or three women follow you around asking what you're looking for. Clumsy shoppers such as us, really aren't sure and usually want to see a catalogue. You then spend fifteen or twenty minutes piling through binders, looking at waif models on the Milan runways wearing the most god awful heroin-chic outfits, completely impractical or wearable anyplace save certain sections of Fresno. I've posted a picture of the outfit Peggy has had made for her first week back at work.

We've gotten the sense that there is a pool of tailors that are for contract hire from the storefronts. When a buyer is ready to commit to being measured, the sales lady gets on the horn and five minutes later a guy arrives by motor scooter to measure you up. Just as quickly as he arrives, said measure man hops on his scooter and rides off into the night. Same thing with the shoes. A phone call is made, the appropriate freelancer smelling of cigarettes arrives a short time later, traces your foot and measures your arches and zips off with the sample of cloth or shoe style. One or two days later, you show up for an adjustment session.

There are also the single-family tailors that do the work in the kitchen or living room of their house, with the storefront being curbside. These are a bit more hit-and-miss, in that you're not sure whether the family is up to par, or that they have the equipment / textiles able to complete the task. Yet, one feels better knowing that they had dealt directly with the producer, as opposed to the random measure men going off to parts unknown.

At the adjustment session, it is an extremely thorough process. At one point in getting a suit made, I had five people tugging and pinching at me, all muttering comments about how it all was hanging. You feel like a super model, full of pins and instructed by onlookers. At the larger places, the adjustments are made upstairs, as the sales ladies get on a microphone / PA system and call for one of the eight-year olds with bleeding fingers to make a nip here or a tuck there on a pant leg or dress hem. Truthfully, we've watched as a shift change has taken place from the 'attic of despair', only to see happy teenagers laughing and joking on their way out. No bleeding fingers to be found.

Tomorrow we're taking a break from our Capitalistic Vanity to explore the My Son sanctuary by boat tour. We'll be hiking around ancient ruins and seeing decrepit temples. Seems like every couple of days, we've been hiking around ancient ruins and seeing decrepit temples. Better than sitting in traffic and seeing decrepit freeways.

posted by ncawthon at 10:31 PM