Ex-Soviets Refreshed In Old Art: Rugmaking

SAMARKAND, Uzbekistan An Oriental carpet mogul from Afghanistanand a caravan of 40 expert weavers have made their way through thePamir Mountains to try to revive the all-but-forgotten ancient craftin the former Soviet Central Asian republics.

Carpet weaving was a thriving home industry in many parts ofUzbekistan and Tajikistan before Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin forcedthe nationalization of all industries and pushed the population intocommunal farms in the 1930s. Peasants could no longer get the yarnand dyes needed for their trade, women were forced to spend theirtime toiling in the cotton fields and rugmaking all but died.

Now, Mohamed Ewaz Badghisi, a 56-year-old entrepreneur who hastaught tens of thousands of people in Afghanistan to weavetraditional carpets with natural dyes, is setting up shop inDushanbe, Tajikistan's capital, and Samarkand, a large city inUzbekistan that was a center of culture and commerce in the days ofthe ancient Silk Road.

"I want to teach these people, because these are the placeswhere weaving originated," Badghisi said.

His experts, who were glad to escape the violent unrest in theirhometown of Kabul, spent six months in Dushanbe teaching about 25local people.

"They are learning slowly," 15-year-old Cobra Badghisi, arelative of Badghisi, said as she knelt on the floor and pulledthreads of silk through a loom at lightning speed. "But they aregetting the hang of it. Now, we've left them there with looms toweave the carpets on their own, and they'll do OK."

She is one of the 40 weaving teachers Badghisi brought with himfrom Afghanistan. Most of the experts are relatives of his, and mostare teenagers and children.

Badghisi supplies his new students in the former Sovietrepublics with materials and looms and pays them 500 rubles permonth, less than $4 at the current rate and about half the wage of alocal janitor. Unemployment runs close to 50 percent in theserepublics, so Badghisi has had no trouble finding people who areeager to learn a new craft, even at such a low wage.

He acknowledges that it is possible to bring carpetmaking to theformer Soviet Central Asian republics only because labor is soinexpensive now. Carpets from Iran and Turkey, for instance, arepricing themselves out of the market because of higher labor costs.

The Badghisi clan has now moved on to Samarkand to set upproduction in this city of 15th century mosques.

Their next stop, Badghisi said, is Bukhara, another city of theSilk Road, which sank into obscurity during the Soviet period.