Teacher Orientation: National Dress

BCF Teacher Andrea in her kira

Getting outfitted for national dress is an exciting part of teacher orientation in Bhutan. As we've discussed in previous posts, national dress is an important part of Bhutanese identity and something that BCF teachers fully embrace once they get to Bhutan.

For women, the traditional national dress is made up of colourful blouses over which are folded a large piece of rectangular cloth called a kira, creating an ankle length dress. A short silk jacket, or toego, may be worn over the kira. Because traditional kira are quite difficult to tie, many women opt to wear the half-kira as their day-to-day dress, with the full-length kira reserved for special occasions. Luckily for our BCF teachers, there is even such thing as a "cheater" kira, which fastens with snaps and hooks instead of having to be tied!

Men wear a gho, which is best described as a full length robe, fastened with a belt. One of our new teachers, Dave, describes the challenges and benefits of the gho in a recent blog post entitled "The Moment You've All Been Waiting For...The Gho!" Dave remarks that he is particularly fond of the gho's large pocket, which he says makes him "basically a marsupial."

Here's a great picture Dave recently posted on his blog of himself in his new gho!

BCF teacher Dave showing off his new gho!

For more info on national dress, check out this post. For some fun, watch this great video.