Glass Dust Coated Thread for Flying Kites (Manza)

In West Bengal, an Eastern state of India, there is a special occassion for flying kites. The day for kite flying is celebrated in Biswakarma Puja ( Sri Sri Biswakarma, Hindu mythological god for engineering and equipment building & manufacturing). This puja occurs in last day of Month Bhadra ( Bhadra- a bengali calender month, corresponding to about mid august to mid september), usually 17th or 18th september each year.

The sky becomes covered by multi coloured kites throughout the whole day, from early morning till sunset. Not only flying kites, there is also kite fighting games in the sky. Those who have good skills with good kite flying thread will become the kings of sky on that day. For this purpose usually Glass dust layered cotton thread ( Called Manza in Indian language) are used to fly kites.

Here i am describing an easy process to make that thread.(Manza, Glass dust coated cotton thread for kite flying)

Materials needed-

1. Cotton thread ( I took 900 meters length 6 cord cotton thread) approx Rs 95

2. Finely powdered glass dust [made fro two fluorescent tubelights using large Iron Mortar and pestle]

3.Sago / Sagoo beads 100g (Rs 10) ( indian common name;boro sabudana)

4. Arrow root powder 50g (Rs 7)

5. Spinning wheel ( Charka is indian name)

The cotton thread to be submerged in water at least 30 mins before starting the final coating procedure.

Sago beads are to be kept in water overnight before the day of making Manza (Indian local term).

Next morning, boil the sago till it becomes thick and viscous. In the meantime, take half glass of water about 100 ml, mix about 50 gm arrow root powder in it, make sure the water is not hot and temp is below 40 degree celcius, otherwise the arrowroot powder will be clumped and solution will not be homogeneous.

Now, mix the solution to the boiling sago mix, stir continuously to prevent clumping, within few minutes a semisolid thick glue like sticky substance will form. Remove the pan/container from heat source and let the mixture cool down to room temperature.

After the sticky material cools down it becomes more viscous, now mix the finely powdered glass dusts into it and mix it well.

This final substance is called Manza in indian language, it is just a sticky mixture of sago arrow root solution with glass dust, now we have to layered it on cotton thread to make the thread sharp for kite flying and kite fighting.

Use a simple spinning wheel (Named Charka in indian Native language) will help to layering and fixing the glass dust over the cotton thread.

The process of layering the glass dust over the cotton thread using spinning wheel (Charka)