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03/04/11
Chronicles of Yarnia
Filed under: General
Posted by: @ 5:54 pm

 

yarnia

Living south of the Yunnan River in China means one thing. There is no central heat. In other words, it can get colder than a witch’s titty in Kunming, even to a formal Chicagoan who’s survived blizzards, sleet, ice-storms and negative wind chill.

But leave it to the ingenious Chinese to have several industries devoted to Yang, or warmth. You can buy space heaters, bed warmers, electric slippers to keep you warmer than a Szechwan hot pot. There are even fuzzy toilet seat covers to keep your cheeks from  getting chapped. But my favorite Chinese innovation is knitting.

OK, I know the Scots think they’ve cornered the market on wool wonders, making bulky cream-colored sweaters to go with their kilts, but in China, knitting needles are as common as chopsticks. No matter where you go, there are industrious women pearling one then dropping two stitches, without the help of a pattern. This fruit vendor at the wet market could weigh apples and count my change without dropping a stitch.  

WetMarketKnitter

I got into the  Yarnia craze, too. While I’ve never been a knitter. I do crochet, a craft I learned from my Grandma Krieger as a child.  So over the winter, I kept my fingers nimble by making several scarves and baby blankets. I would crochet while curled up under our heated “cuddle cocoon”.  We’d drape a comforter over a space heater, and I’d crochet while Jeff would watch bootleg DVDs.   

Chinese space heaters are designed to go under sheets, or so we were told. I did have an electric sheet-warming-water-bottle that was shaped as a fuzzy bunny. It caught on fire and exploded. Don’t worry: when the bunny over heated, its innards expanded like an  oompa loompa from Willie Wonkaland, popped, causing it to douse its own flames.

P1290018 - Copy

 But back to Yarnia. In China, you don’t buy yarn at Joan’s fabrics, but little yarn shops like this one. They are full of colorful balls of cashmere, cotton and wool yarn of every color of the rainbow. The old lady, the wise and all knowing Queen of Yarnia, would let me into her shop. She knew how much yarn one would need to make a scarf, hat, snuggie or whatever.

After I’d pick out some yarn, she would tell me the price per kg and how much was needed. The queen would then use her hand cranked spindle to wind me my own skein, like a wise old  Chinese Rumplestiltskin.

As much as I hate the cold, the trips to Yarnia made it fun.
But now spring has sprung in Kunming.  Adventures  to Yarnia will have to wait until he fall.

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