ABSTRACT
Looking back upon her life as a silk weaver not only brings back memories of joy and pride but also of painful backbones and fingers that grew crooked, and of the fear and anger she felt towards the middleman. Sotheap shivers telling how chen used his motorbike to roam around and check the colors she applied and the clarity of her patterns. Sotheap feared his judgment as he had the power to lower the price of her products. Talking about chen, Sotheap suddenly whispers that her grandmother was Chinese too. She was once told by her mother that her grandmother had come to Cambodia a long time ago and had married a Khmer farmer. After her revelation Sotheap hastens to add that she herself is not a chen but a Khmer and a devout Buddhist. But to prove her Chinese ancestry, Sotheap invites me inside the house to show me a small Chinese shrine. In front of the shrine she explains that her daughter became seriously ill ten years ago. She feared for her life and went to the doctor in her village. Dissatisfied with his advice, she turned to a Chinese fortune-teller at Saiwaa market who explained that it was saen kbal tuk, the Chinese month of the ghosts, and that her daughter’s sickness was caused by the angry ghosts of her (Chinese) ancestors. Since then, Sotheap has followed the fortuneteller’s advice and burns incense and offers fruit during saen kbal tuk. Then Sotheap turns to a corner of her house to rummage in an old carton box from which she lifts a black hand-woven farmer’s pants (kho kansaen). Resembling the traditional Chinese garments often worn at religious events she states: “These are my grandfather’s, he wore them when he visited the pagoda.”
