Preforming on leather hard clay in Yang Tao village : preforming the bottom of a roasting pan (suông war ba)

Before starting the preforming, Yo Khoanh polishes the rim of the suông with a stone to strengthen it before putting it upside down on the floor. Then, she scratches the outer part of the bottom to take of the square angle. She uses her index finger to dig a hole in the centre of the bottom that she opens up, by pulling up the clay, until her whole hand can pass through the hole. She then pushes up the bottom from the inside with her right hand that is going through the hole. She walks around the pot to make sure that the bottom is evenly pushed up. She regularly pushes up the bottom from the inside and scratches the outer surface with her fingers to even it and fill the cracks created by the pushing. She also sometimes spreads some clay that she scraped out to even the surface. When she is satisfied with the shape of the bottom, she scrapes the outer surface diagonally from the outside to the centre, pulling up clay toward the hole that slowly gets filled up, until she completely closes it. Finally, she gives a last scratching round to the bottom to make sure that the hole is closed well. On the side, we can see Mai Kim decorating her cooking pot (dlah pay).