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Exciting news, the first phase of Bootstrap’s suzani revival project is complete! We have crisscrossed the mountainous country of Tajikistan searching through large towns and tiny villages to find all the women in the country who still know the ancient suzani sewing tradition. We are so excited, and so is Tajikistan—even the President of the country has commented on the project!

Our partner organization, NABWT, has created a very useful website of the first phase. On the site you can compare how different the suzanis are from village to village. Why is this, you ask? Huge mountains divide the towns, so over centuries a separate language of symbols has been created in each town, and this is reflected in the suzanis. NAMBWT’s site is currently available in Russian. We used the automatic web translation tool to help guide us around.

Here is the site's homepage. You can find a map of areas covered and see the design differences here, and a profile of each master craftswoman here. The English version of the site is under development, we will let you know as soon as it is available. (We just couldn’t resist showing you a sneak peak right away.)
 

News has just surfaced from Nigora, the team leader of Bootstrap's suzani quest, the extraordinary textile of Tajikistan. Nigora has traveled from the Pamir Mountains to Panjakent, on the border of Uzbekistan.

This is her latest tale.

Nigora writes...

Sharp at 6 morning, I was woken up by mobile music. I barely could understand what was going on, was I hearing the song in my dream or in reality? Somebody was holding the mobile at the door of my room and chuckling.

“It’s not funny!!! I arrived at 1am last night! Pleeeeease, leave me,” I said with a pleading voice.

But the music just grew louder and louder. Censorial words are not enough to describe my emotional condition and unprintable words were coming on my mind. I jumped out of my bed and angrily opened the door.

“Morning lazybones!!!” cheerfully told Zarrina. She moved me aside and like a morning butterfly flew into the room. “Huh, still sleeping when we have such an important day ahead!” I couldn’t believe my eyes and ears. “What are you doing here?” surprisingly asked Zarrina. ”What am I doing here? I have spent the last month crossing every part of this land to find our country’s remaining suzani masters and they are coming to see you today. So be quick this is a monumental day, we have found 10 masters! Zarrina is a loan officer of our partner microfinance bank Imon International. As my head woke up my frustration vanished and my excitement grew.

Soon after I was introduced to these masters who had come to the remote city of Panjakent from their village homes. I felt guilty for that moment thinking of how tired I felt, but it was nothing compared to the journeys these women had taken.

We got to know each other over a pot of hot lemon tea. A warm stomach leads to warm conversation— this is the tradition in our country. The women told me about their life, their exquisite craft and what kind of problems they face in their work. Almost all of the women spoke of problems with access to good raw materials. Silk production, once done in the home is a skill that has absolutely vanished in Tajikistan, so those remaining suzani masters are forced to use very low quality threads, and the costs are still so high for these rural women who are mostly unemployed.

We asked our sacred suzani women what would be there dream. The eldest woman, Matlyuba Apa, replied, "In this part of the world we try not to have dreams, but for me I dream of silk returning to our land, so that I can create the shimmering suzanis of my childhood. That is my wish.” I, too, shared this wish. We will find a way to bring our ancient silk worms back to our country in the heart of the Silk Road.

Click here to buy your own unique Tajik suzani. You get beauty, you give possibility, you craft a more connected world.

Check back soon to hear more of Nigora's journey. 

Images of Panjakent

Man from Panjakent sells dried yogurt in the market. It's wildly salty but, after a few tries, an entirely addictive snack.

A street scene of Panjakent. The woman's hair is the traditional style for the region. 

As we blogged earlier, we were beyond thrilled to learn that the Swiss government agreed to sponsor our suzani revival project in Tajikistan. (That’s the country next to Afghanistan, Pakistan and China). And now the crazy dream to take back the suzani tradition from the history books and bring pride and economic empowerment to a strong but forgotten people is becoming a reality...

We will be led on this journey by the inimitable Nigora. Nigora does crazy things in her commitment to craft, like traveling right through the middle of battlefields to connect with people preserving their ancient traditions (I’m serious, she was just in Kabul. Yes, as in Kabul, Afghanistan).

So without further ado, I bring you the first in what we hope will be a series of updates and the start of a conversation. The journey begins setting off for Pamir, the Tajik mountain range.

If you have any questions or comments, we would really love your participation.  This project is very much in process and your questions, comments or thoughts inspire our work, Nigora's work and most importantly the artisans’ work. The internet is everywhere and they do see this feedback and we will get their responses to you. 

Nigora Writes....
Pamir. Our team was so excited to explore Pamir to find if there were any living suzani masters that we didn’t mind the 18 hours drive from Dushanbe [capital of Tajikistan] and the lie down through mountainous roads. Those hours seemed nothing to us as we were heading to Pamir, to the roof of the world.

“If the sun will appear we will start our journey”- said Jamal, our driver, originally himself from Pamir. “But if the weather will get cool and cloudy we should stay in Dushanbe”. The weather was very mild and warm that we didn’t pay attention what he told. How true those words would be…and journey started…

Passing the beautiful mountainous roads and watching magnificent mountains Jamal told: “High and majestic mountains know everything but silent”, and really it seemed mountains were watching us and invisibly showing us the way..
Suddenly in the midday the weather has changed to rainy and snowy, Jamal started get worried, and we didn’t know why. “ We should pass the river before it gets dark otherwise we have to spend the night in the car, yesterday another car was washed away, happily passengers survived”-nervously told Jamal.

March and April considered to be the dangerous months for travelling to Pamir as the ice start melting on mountains, which brings floods and waterfalls. Our car safely passed through 3 big waterfalls owing to our driver and reached Pamir late night. Thank Jamal, you are the best. Sleep well tomorrow we wake up early to speak to villagers to see if there are any masters. I make my prayer and now to sleep.
 

 The inimitable Nigora

Click here to buy your own unique Tajik suzani. You get beauty, you give possibility, you craft a more connected world.

We are delighted to announce the launch of Save Our Suzanis, Bootstrap’s unique development project implemented with our development partner, Imon International, and sponsored by the Swiss government.

Suzani making has been central to Tajik culture for centuries. Suzanis are not just exquisite pieces, they are the central avenue for mothers to bond with their daughters. This hugely important tradition, however, is under threat—while all Tajik women once knew the art of suzani making, today only a handful of these women remain. Utilizing the skills of Bootstrap master suzani maker Soliha Sharopova, Save Our Suzanis will reclaim and revive the suzani sector in Tajikistan, increase cooperation across the country (Tajikistan is still recovering from civil war) and, critically, create sustainable income-generating opportunities for poor rural women. Check back often for updates on this exciting project!

While more than 60% of the population lives below the poverty line, Tajikistan is still rich in culture. This post provides a glimpse of the country's traditions and demonstrates how some Tajiks are coming up with their own innovative ways to end poverty.

Smoke from shashlik (shish kabab) stands covers the main road in Khojand, Tajikistan.

Instead of staying in a chain hotel, we chose to support a local micro-enterprise. We were the first guests of a women who converted her apartment into a charming, entirely Tajik guest house. The room was on the second floor the third from the left. It was a cozy place with some crazy wallpaper!

Maxine in the kitchen of the guest house, entranced by that crazy wallpaper!

The apartment's mailbox.

And the stairwell. 

This is how many Tajiks men pass their time, telling stories with an endless pot of tea.

Tajik bread not only tastes delicious, it is also a central part of Tajik tradition with its own set of rules. As a guest in a Tajik home you will likely be greeted with this bread. To receive it, first place your left hand on your heart and receive the bread with your right hand. When eating the bread, do not place it face down. And, if there is any left do not throw it out, most likely your host will give you the bread to take home or they will use it to feed their animals. 

The women of Tajikistan are hardworking, strong and beautiful. They have survived Soviet rule, civil war and are now often the sole caretakers as their husands and sons try to earn a living in Russia. We came across many of these women on our journey, this post shows just a few of them. If you have further interest in this subject, The New York Times has a great post on the situation of Tajik women. You can get it here.

Locals and travelers have come together at the Panjshanbe Market since the days of the Silk Road. At that time, it was open only on Thursdays, which is how the market got its name --"panishanbe" is "Thursday" in Persian. Though the Silk Road is long gone, the market continues to thrive. The Bootstrap team had a few moments to catch the sites and personality of this cavernous place that is the true heart of Khujand. We present a few of the highlights.