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Whatever I can do, must be done, because one cannot work with all the looms in there, like that...
And there are three more looms outside that should be installed, but there is no more room.
I tried to maintain this thing...
We got popular...
Of course, there's room for improvement,
but... compared to the way things were...
I don't have a showroom...
A customer comes and the merchendise is in the luggage.
Well, I think right now it's in the car, I don't think my husband unloaded it.
I ask them: “What are you intrested in?”
for I can't unpack all the products.
They want a traditional shirt or a traditional towel and you show them...
But it's embarrassing to take them out of the luggage in front of the customer.
Therefore... I suffer...
This started to hurt!
But... however...
I couldn't have done things differently.
We had to buy the van.
But... eventually... the next step...
If there's no other solution...
...we will do something with our own resources
But this building cost about 100 Million RON (2500 Euros) a few years back.
Which was a lot of money for us!
It was very useful, though, because we were also struggling with the silkworms.
It's a lot easier here. I had less mulberry leaves, but...
Now we also have mulberry leaves here and we don't have to go elsewhere to get it.
Some things have changed around here.
I guess...
...we should see some results.
Now, it's true...
...we don't only live out of silk.
But it started to work, this year brought us some pennies.
This season caught us a bit... unprepared.
Yeah...
This winter we only manufactured silk for someone in Spain.
And since this work cannot be done very quickly...
...it took us quite some time, and...
...the summer found us short on silk stock.
We are receiving commissions.
But it's hard to make one or two shirts and send them.
Just the drives... taking them to the courier and all the costs lower the actual price of the shirt...
...which isn't very high anyway.
We muddle through...
I sent Alina...
...last week she received some fabrics because she said she'll make a couple of silk clothing.
Any further than this, fashion design and other stuff, just aren't my responsability...
...really, I can't do everything in this world... in the field, I mean...
Further on, let the designer do their job.
Since it's handcrafted fabric, it's pretty expensive, and...
...this doesn't suit them with all the posibilities...
...to import large width fabric at a good price...
I traveled to Iaşi once...
...well, I guess there were other interests there, they called me there and made me spend all that money...
...to tell me that they buy from some place with... I don't know...
...with 5-7 euros per meter.
Now let's get serious, say I'm being most indulgent and...
I did all the maths, I remember, and I think that I couldn't have sold it for less than 16-17 euros...
It would've ment I worked for nothing and that would've been pointless.
I were in a situation where I had work anyway...
So with or without them, I still had work to do.
Well... everybody...
I kind of had enough, everybody is interested in the silkworms,
there are money given through European Union funding schemes, but...
Nobody would take this seriously,
they would only profit from the project and the money, but no one would actually do what we do, so...
I didn't apply for any funding scheme, I did what I did...
I did it cause I enjoyed doing it...
Now...
What can I say? Some don't even know what a silkworm is but they want European funding.
We had these kind of visitors and phone calls in the past...
Let them try it, they should all start where we started from and see...
Maybe they have some other...
I don't know...
Some other opportunities, different thinking...
I asked them... it depends on what you want to do...
Ok, you raise silkworms, but what do you want to do next?
I don't know...
Well... to be honest...
...hadn't I started to also weave the cocoons...
What would we have done with the cocoons?
Whom would we have sold them to? What would've been the price?
And... it wouldn't have been worth it.
With silkworms is, as I say, like in agriculture, with the livestock:
it's pointless to raise a calf and give it to someone else who gets all the profit,
hacks it to pieces and sels it, if...
...they earn a lot more than you do.
It's the same here...
We chose to do the whole process and...
this adds some value and helps us not to give up, because, however...
...there's something there.
Now I have to prepare the looms, for if I'm leaving for five days on Monday, the girls gotta have work to do.
While I'm gone, they shouldn't feel I'm not here.
Otherwise... they make no progress, if they don't have what they need.
We can't give up the fair either because...
...anyway, it's a fair... it was a good market for us...
especially because there the silk is saught-after,
people know us and look for us...
And... it was also hard to get in there.
It took me a while...
And once you're in, you've got to play along.
It's gonna burn a bit, but not too much...
Feel it like this, you'll see it's greasy.
More...
-Silicon? -Sericin!
Sericin...
Sericin... It started to soften, it has to boil a little more.
Sericin is like the starch... of the silk.
This removal is probably done in big factories.
I don't think the old women in the past did it because...
...it's not common knowledge and everything you can find, old scarfs and...
...even shirts or towels made out of silk are all like this, with sericin left on the fabric.
- Is Bianca here? - They didn't even know... She's eating!
I found out about this reading somewhere that...
one must boil the fabric with...
homemade soap, actually.
That's what I read.
But I do it easier with lye...
...for we are close to the lye factory and it comes in handy.
And since we're living in the century of speed...
...it works faster.
Now it has to boil for about half an hour, or as much as we want...
...maybe even less, but there will still be sericin left and it won't soften well enough.
For about ten years we've been raising silkworms...
...and, slow but steady, from year to year, we learned doing something new;
I... found out some new secret and applied it.
So basically... we've been doing this for about ten years.
We have the workshop for about fifteen, but...
...we've been working silk for about ten.
I persevered.
Any detail, any secret that I came across...
...I tried to put to practice and...
...mostly I succeeded; well, maybe not everything...
...there's still room for improvement.
But handcrafting everything...
Well, many clients find some...
They call them flaws, but...
I don't think they're flaws, one just can't do better...
...handcrafting.
Machines are machines, they are programmed...
...they can make no mistakes, but...
...people sometimes do. Failure is a part of trying.
But we try to eliminate them too... as much as possible.
As much as working conditions allow it.
This is it...
The chrysalis.
Let my mother-in-law pick the rest of them...
She ain't got anything better to do, anyway.
This was a cure for her, she's suffered a head surgery and...
With this...
...I gave her an occupation, I mean...
...she comes daily: "Come on, let me teasel!"
That's what she's still able to do... she's no longer capable of doing anything else.
Doing this... she's passing the time.
It's helpful for me because...
otherwise I should pay someone and...
...not little money because... it's not hard work but it's time consuming.
To teasel one kilo of cocoons...
You need about...
...maybe three days. No, about a week, I guess.
For one kilo of cocoons. To stretch it all.
We'll dry it, and give it to her.
- Go put on your slippers! - No!
Go for you'll catch a cold!
The girl's learning the craft, right?
See how it's unfolding? Like an eight.
Well, if it's visible...
It's all around...