Luntaya Acheik

0:04 I'm never comfortable in Western-style suit. Suit is not my traditional costume. My traditional costume is my lungi, and I love acheik and I wear them all the time for special occasions. I remember seeing this fabric for the first time in my parents' wedding photo. 0:26 Myanmar is very diverse. We have about 130 ethnic groups. You know, my mother's side comes from Shan, but my grandfather, he originally came from Yunnan to Myanmar. And then on my father's side, they are Burma. And this fabric belongs to Bamar identity, Bamar heritage. 0:49 So regardless of their different ethnic groups, they chose this particular acheik...so the bride and the groom wearing this fabric, and they kept it. I was allowed to touch it! It's sort of like the fabric that stays in my memory. Luntaya means 100 shuttles, and acheik means interlinking the shuttles. 1:17 The technique is extremely sophisticated. The fabric is luxury. In Pan Nwe design, which is a classic acheik weave, it features a multi undulating stripe with orchid motif. When Turquoise Mountain was designing this pan nwe fabric, they looked at all my acheik lungis and they also looked at my sisters acheik lungis, my late mothers acheik lungi. 1:47 So, they looked across all this and they created this design. We don't have a lot of Acheik weavers anymore because the fabric is extremely expensive. It's silk and a weaver can only finish two inches per day. It's highly prized, it's highly demanding. I mean, there's a lot of women involved in this, you know, the woman weaver who learned this weaving technique from her mother who was a master weaver, and the women of Myanmar are paying a huge price to possess this fabric. 2:24 This kind of design is really endangered. So, we really need our support for these weavers so that they can continue weaving and they can compete with machine-made imitation. I don't feel like I belong anywhere except, you know, except here. 2:46 So even when I was living abroad, I've always wanted to come back and live and work here. My country is going through a lot of challenges. Most of the time we feel very sad about the challenges we have to go through, especially the weavers who wove this fabric. They are living under very difficult circumstances. 3:08 But we still have something to be proud of and this is this Acheik fabric. This technique we've been preserving for hundreds of years. Before Myanmar was annexed by the British, it was really flourishing, the fabric was only for the royal family, so the fabric has a wealth of history and how it spreads across the society of Myanmar. 3:36 When we were exhibiting Acheik in London and Paris, we have a lot of compliments as one of the outstanding fabrics people have seen. Even when I was living abroad, for example, my graduation ceremony, I wore one of the Acheik. It has a meaning to me, it has a meaning to my identity. 3:59 I'm very proud of it and I'm sure all the Myanmar people will be very proud of it as well.