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What web page isn't improved by the face of Anna Karina? Alphaville is great introduction to Godard. Made in 1965, it appeared at the tail end of the torrent of creativity that marked Godard's early career. The music, photography, and performances are all excellent. Particularly noteworthy is the eerie sans laryngeal croaking of Alpha 60, the narrator.

Here's a bit of a trivia challenge. Did the set of Miss Wellenmellon's boarding house in The Ladies' Man inspire Godard in Tout Va Bien? I haven't seen either of these movies in a long long time, but that is the vague impression I've been entertaining for some years now. Jerry Lewis is held in high regard in France so it seems entirely possible.

This post will begin a series of uploads of DIVX format classic films. You can click here to download the Bittorrent Client. Once installed, click on the approriate link above to get Alphaville. I hope to be seeding this more or less constantly over the next week or so.

I'll finish off this series of photos with a "hat" I believe I bought in Kaili, Guizhou. This piece is about 20 cm wide and 2 metres long. Originally, it's meant to be wrapped around the head, but sometimes I use it as a scarf in the winter. It's a silk and cotton mixture.

These photos here are just a sampling of my collection. I would be happy to show more on request.

A final note I'd like to make is about the meaning of this motif, the one in the black and purple flower cloth I posted earlier. I've seen it referred to as many things; usually it's a snail. I was told however, that it's a butterfly, a totemic creature in Hmong legend. I've searched the internet for confirmation of this but I haven't found anything. Maybe the snail, slow, steady, and self sufficient, has powerful resonance with the nomadic Hmong. I prefer the butterfly though, which is so suggestive of the beautiful potential that lies hidden within us. I'll let W. H. Davies explain why.

The Example

Here's an example from
a butterfly;
that on a rough hard rock
happy can lie;
friendless and all alone
on this unsweetened stone.

Now let my bed be hard,
no care take I;
I'll make my joy like this
small butterfly;
whose happy heart has power
to make a stone a flower.

Travelling in the backwoods of Yunnan, one never knows what's coming next. The guidebooks only cover the few towns popular with tourists, and the local maps give only the name of otherwise anonymous towns. My map indicated that Jinping was a small county seat and was home to at least a half a dozen of China's minority groups. It showed that its location, 20 kilometres north of the Vietnamese border, was isolated enough to ensure that very few would take the time to visit. Only after the bus made its way down over the last pass did I discover that Jinping was a charming town on a mountain side overlooking a narrow valley. And I had to wait another day before I would meet Chunli, the most beautiful woman in town.

No, I'm not quite finished with my Hmong material, but even this story is marginally connected. However, another story about a deaf school in Nicaragua where the children seem to have invented their own sign language really caught my eye. It brought back memories of my own attempts to learn Chinese sign language and all the fun I had with it.

My brother told me something funny he picked up from his visit to the Wolverhampton Deaf Film & TV Festival, which by the way is scheduled for November this year. Talking or crackling snack wrappers during a film won't disturb a deaf audience. But keep your hands down. Touching your hair or face or making gestures will draw attention and will not be appreciated.

These are sections of batik, a process where material is painted with wax and then dyed in indigo. The wax is removed, leaving the white background of the original cloth visible through the dye. I bought these in Jinping county, Yunnan. They are strips about 22 cm wide. I bought several metres from several different rolls. You should be getting familiar with Hmong design elements by now. I link here to a photograph I took in Wenshan county, Yunnan, at the "flower trampling festival." The skirts making their debut here are made in part with this sort of batik.

This is a detail from a Hmong baby carrier. It's made in Guizhou and about 2cm square. I was told that the eight-cornered figure represents the seeds of star anise, an ingredient of five spice powder, the quintessential spice mixture in Chinese cooking. I've never been able to confirm this but it seems likely because star anise, or bajiao, literally "octagon" in Chinese, is widely grown in Hmong areas and would be of significance due to the high returns it yields at the market. Interestingly, the second link above tells a little about the occult value of star anise in Western mythology.

This is a silver bracelet I bought in Guizhou, China. It weighs 90 grams and the design is quite unique. It's made of one piece of silver that is heavy and almost square in the middle and tapers to points at the ends, where they are wrapped around in a spiral. I also have some earrings bought in Sapa, Vietnam. They are much lighter and lower quality, but with the same design.

There are many places on the net where Hmong design is on display. I'll link to this one in particular as it offers a simple schematic expanation of the symbols used.

The above are examples of Hmong "flower cloths" or paj ntaub. They are representative of the many I saw in the northern Lao town of Muang Sing near the Chinese border. The colours tend to be vivid and dark an their size is around 50 cm square. They are sold to tourists for around $5 and I bought quite a few as they were well made, unique, and light-weight. They were also the most striking items I could find in town. What more could I want in a souvenir? Strangely, I had never seen flower cloths in China though I had delved rather deeply into Hmongdom in at least 3 prefectures of Yunnan as well as parts of Guizhou.