Note 11 — Economic Life

Both men and women may engage in cutting the rice, but as the latter are much the more dexterous workers, this task is generally assigned to them (Plate LIV). The grain is cut so as to leave stalks about ten inches in length; these are laid in the free hand until a bunch of considerable size has accumulated, when they are bound together with strips of bark.11 At the end of the day these bundles are carried to the drying yards, where they remain until the whole crop is harvested. A drying yard is a plot of ground surrounded by a bamboo fence of such a height that it is impossible for fowls and the like to gain entrance. When all the bundles are thoroughly dried, they are placed in the granary, and from that time on the handling of the rice is given over to the women.