National clothing Our friend Guli talked
Ryia and I into singing an Uzbek song for the Navrus celebration at our school
and she found national dresses for us to wear as well. The dresses are called
atlas, which is Uzbek for silk. This is pretty traditional and many women still
dress this way, especailly in the smaller cities. Notice Guli's braids. Traditionally
Uzbek women were supposed to have 40 braids that hung down to their knees! Long
thick hair is considered a real mark of beauty and indeed it is quite sricking
especially when it swings as they dance! Oh and you should know we moved people
to tears with our song . . . apparently they thought it was pretty hilarious
that two Americans would sing "We won't let anyone take Uzbekistan away
from us" since they couldn't think of anyone wanting to take Uzbekistan
and even less that we would want to protect it.
