The Palaung Land Website

Posted By admin on April 6, 2008

By: Mai Aik Zham

The Palaung people use the bamboo tubs to boil the tea for drinking and bamboo cups culturally when they hack the firewood in the jungle. It is sweat tease in the forest and also they don’t need to bring the kitten from home. It is easy to cut the bamboo and use it.

They use the cows to carry their firewood from the field

They hack the firewood every year for the steaming of tealeaves and for cooking. There is electric power only for lighting at night. It is just a few households can use the electric power. The rest of the people have no electric power in the countryside. They remain using the firewood for the cooking and use the patrol for the lighting at night.

It is in December they start to hark. This season is called “Pa Kyow Auu” in Palaung language. It means months one within 12 months in a year. This season is cold and they can work probably in the forest. During this time they chop the bush in the tea field before the tealeaves appear.A Palaung woman, Lway Aym Kham Aye 23 said, “We the women used to chop the shrubs in the tea field in late December with the mattocks.”

“We go to the field with many people in a field once time. Because we see how much we finish in one day.”

“We call ‘Ka Way‘ this culture. It like you hire 10 people to work for you in one day and you have to work for each person once up to 10 till you finish the rest”

“It is a very hilarious culture for the Palaung people”.

“This time most men are harking the logs in the jungle like we do ‘Ka Way‘. If men and women are doing this culture, the men hark the logs for the women in their forest and the women mattock the shrubs for the men’s field. “The men they can hark 3 yards a day in 5 people. A big household fuels about 10 yards a year. A small household fuels at least 2 yards per year. “We draw onto 10 yards a year because we have many big tea fields. The cooking also takes a lot of dry wood,” said Lway Aym Kham Aye. “We have old grandfather and grandmother they fire the whole day and whole night in the cold season.”

Mai Nyee Naing from a small household said, “We just spend 3 yards of fire wood a year. We have only one tea field given from our grand as the legacy”

“The cooking is not fueling too much” In one month “Pa Kyow Auu” they spend time in logging with hiring each other. They haven’t carry yet to their home. In January they call “Pa Kyow Ayl”, they start to carry the logs back from the field to home. Most of the people who carry are women. They appreciate that the harking is finished men’s job and carrying is women’ job. But some are doing together.

At this time also they hire each other to finish the carrying because if they finish theirs early they can carry other household by given day wage.

They don’t carry back at once time from the field because there is too long trip about 30 minutes for footing. They carry and put once at the mid distance of way to be easy for the students who are at school at that time. Some people they use horses and cows to carry from the place where they put it at way.

“We use horses for carrying the firewood and also people as well. I carry 1 or 2 times in the morning and go to the school, ” said Lway Aym Khan Aye. Mai Nyee Naing said, “I just carry the wood one time in the morning. I take a shower quickly and grab the bag go for schooling.”

Categories: CULTURE/LITERATURE
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