Intha Fishermen
Beez Neez now Chy Whella
Big Bear and Pepe Millard
Tue 5 Dec 2017 23:57
|
The Intha Fishermen of Inle
Lake
    We began our tour this morning at
eight, Lake Inle was covered in mist. Colour us excited when our first Intha fishermen appeared.
 Unique cone
nets, now we have to hope to see them do their one-legged
stuff.
  Just as we thought
this chap was about to row – no, he bobbed
down.
    We watched as a young lad set out his net until he had a knot to sort out.
  The real
deal.
 Intha fishermen are a Tibeto-Burmese ethnic group who
speak an archaic dialect of Burmese. They tend to vegetables on the floating
gardens but are well known for their one-legged rowing. Ladies row in the
traditional way, it’s only the men (who begin at a very early age) who pull the
oar with one leg whilst the other foot stands on a tiny flat platform at the
front of the boat. They fish by net but also use a unique net cone.
  A plunge area is selected. The fisherman pushes
it down.
  His foot pushes the cone to the bottom
of the shallow water, then he pushes the net down with his
trident. The fish get caught in pockets which are the net folded back on
the frame (seen as double thickness in the cone shot).
  Up came the net and there was
one tiny fish.
 Posing with
his catch. Intha means Sons of the Lake, as we
headed back to Nyaung Shwe we saw so many of these ‘sons’ and enjoyed them as
the sun set. What a wonderful thing to have seen in
action.
              ALL IN ALL AN INCREDIBLE
TECHNIQUE
THE MOST AMAZING
SPECTACLE |