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#28ChineseMemories

#28ChineseMemories Day 4: Traditional Mei Tai (Baby Sling)

Youtube video of how to put on a mei tai.

I remember being carried around in a mei tai, or a baby sling, by my grandmother. We had a mei tai in a basket-weave style, and I remember watching my grandmother tie the sling onto her while my brother Adam or any of our younger cousins waited patiently on her back.

I remember thinking that these mei tai looked complicated to get on! But as you can see from the video above, they’re actually easier to put on than expected. I know these days (and maybe even back then in the late 1980s) that there are more ‘advanced’ models of baby slings, but I am curious to find a traditional one like what my grandmother and my mother used.

My brother Adam said one of his earliest memories from childhood was of falling asleep in a bag and then waking up on my grandmother’s back as she carried him in a mei tai walking the three of us back to her house (my grandparents’ house was only two houses away from my parents’ house).

Maybe one day I can find a similar mei tai that my grandmother had; I don’t think my parents have any more of those since I don’t recall my older siblings using mei tai when their kids were babies.