Well, tossed and turned all night and this morning I woke early with a doozy of a head cold. Great. Tis life I suppose. So, I went downstairs to take some medicine and a little breakfast. Even at 7 am, the sun is already shining brightly into the gompa. That’s when I heard some strange noises, kind of a clicking but a second whirling noise. How strange because it sounded as if it was coming from the gompa. I took my shoes off and took a peek. And who do I see, but Ani Tsatsa sewing. Even sickness couldn’t keep me from being curious so I walked over. She said she was sewing covers for the new prayer sets.
But the amazing thing was that the machine was a beautiful hand-crank model. Not really surprising when you consider that many in the countryside don’t have electricity because they are constantly moving with their livestock. She was a little embarrassed that I wanted to take a picture but I explained that my mother was a seamstress and that my first sewing machine was an old belt driven model almost like hers (but hers looked brand new or at least lovingly took care of).
Having satisfied my curiosity, I left her to her work but I thought it might be a pleasant thing for others to see – technology that was a bit slow but so elegantly simple. If only more things were so.
