WEAVING SONGKET AT BENTONG PRISON
‘Tenun Pahang’, which has royal status, is woven at two prisons in Pahang. FAUZIAH ISMAIL and TEH ATHIRA YUSOF join Tengku Puan Pahang during a visit to a weaving workshop at one of the prisons
“KAIN siapa ni?” (whose fabric is this)?” she asked. “Kain Tengku Puan (the fabric is Tengku Puan’s),” said the weaver.
She went to another mesin kek and asked another weaver. She got the same answer.
There were 28 traditional looms (a frame or machine of wood or other material in which a weaver forms cloth out of thread) in the workshop.
The inmates were weaving a silk fabric called Tenun Pahang Diraja, which is also called Tenun Pahang.
And these fabrics are certainly special in that they are designed by the wardens of Bentong Prison and woven by the inmates.
Behind the walls of the 10-yearold prison is a double-storey building that houses the weaving workshop for Tenun Pahang Diraja.
Some 70 inmates work there seven days a week. They are paid according to their experience.
“I try to come once a month,” said Tengku Puan Pahang Tunku Azizah Aminah Maimunah Iskandariah.
This particular visit, however, was special.
Besides bringing some foreign friends to introduce them to the Tenun Pahang Diraja, Tunku Azizah wanted to meet the five inmates who had written a “thank you” letter to her.
The letter was slipped in with a gift, the kain keruping, which the Prisons Department had given to her in recognition of her efforts to preserve the Tenun Pahang Diraja, at a recent dinner in Kuala Lumpur.
It was also to recognise her efforts in giving prison inmates a chance to gain new skills and earn a livelihood.
The handwritten letter had the inmates’ names along with their thumbprints.
“I was surprised when I saw the letter. I was even more surprised when I read the letter. And I cried,” she said.
The five inmates stood in line to greet her. The colour of their shirts denoted how long they have been in detention.
“So all of you wrote the letter? Thank you, thank you,” Tunku Azizah said, evidently moved by what the inmates wrote.
“Panjang”, “Black”, “Gafar”, “Atan” and “Jimi” expressed their appreciation for being given the chance to meet her at the workshop.
They also thanked Tunku Azizah for giving them guidance and job opportunities.
She gave them some words of encouragement, thanking them for doing a good job at weaving the keruping.
Before they left, she asked what food she could send to them.
“McDonald’s? KFC? (Or) cook for you?” she asked.
They settled for KFC.
It was easy to forget that the workshop was part of the prison as it looked like a typical weaving workspace.
The kek took up the middle section of the floor. Another section was where the inmates prepared the threads.
Surprisingly, the inmates in the workshop were all males.
“You know why no women are doing the Tenun Pahang ? It is because it takes strength to do this,” Tunku Azizah said, referring to the beating-up or battening of the loom to push the threads together.
It takes up to three months to complete a sarong, or longer if it is an intricate design.
The design is drawn on a piece of paper and pasted on the kek. The weaver would refer to it to weave the fabric.
One project which Tunku Azizah was exceptionally proud of was her niece Tunku Tun Aminah Maimunah Iskandariah Sultan Ibrahim’s baju kurung Teluk Belanga which the latter wore on her wedding day.
The Tenun Pahang Diraja songket was made by the inmates of Penor Prison.
Tunku Azizah makes at least two trips overseas for her weaving projects. Her entourage includes wardens from the Bentong and Penor prisons.
“They don’t go there to just look, but I insist that they learn from the weavers there so that they are able to train the inmates later.”
A warden said he had gone to India, Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia with Tunku Azizah.
“We learn weaving techniques and we teach the inmates,” he said.
What is the future of these inmates after they have completed their sentences?
“You will come and work for me, yes?” Tunku Azizah asked an inmate who nodded his head in agreement.
It was reported that former convicts who had been trained to weave the Tenun Pahang Diraja during their incarceration would be employed in a tenun village to be built in the Penor Prison.
During the visit, Tunku Azizah engaged almost all the inmates in conversation. That probably explained the respect the inmates have for her.
As we walked out of the workshop, Tunku Azizah asked the inmates, “Original or spicy?”, referring to the KFC that she would be sending to the workshop.
“Spicy,” they shouted in unison.
The camaraderie was unquestionable.