Clothes of the Ma Ethnic

The Ma people mainly live in Lam Dong province. The clothes have their own identities in decorating the female clothes, especially the sense of aestheticism. In the harvest time, men often work with shirts on and in the winter, they wear blankets. The Ma ethnic has a tradition of teeth saw (Ca rang), pierce ear (Cang tai) and wearing a lot of jewellery.

Male clothes

The Ma men usually wear their long hair in buns, no shirts and  loin clothes. There are many kind of loin clothes with are different in colors and sizes. The most formal one usually has glass-beads and long fringes on. Besides, they often wear split jumpers of with longer back panel covering the bum. There are also several kinds of shirts:  long-sleeved, short sleeved or non-sleeved shirts. Leader often twists his hair in a bun with a feather on,  holding a shield and spear.

Female clothes

Women have long hair in buns. Long time ago they used to wear no shirts and dresses and some of them wore jumpers. The female shirt fits the body and is long enough to the waist with no split  panels in the same length and low round collar. It looks like a white rectangular. The below half of front and back panels are mainly decorated red, green patterns in the lay out of a horizon ribbon and a lot of geometric patterns. The decoration are made in both edges of the skirt. The dress is an un-opened one and decorated in various styles. Normally women chose geometric patterns in green, red, yellow and white on the  indigo – blue ground following the lay out of the traditional horizon ribbon. Sometimes, the above dress is often decorated closed red or green geometric patterns on the white ground. Men and women are interested in wearing bracelets and watches with intaglios – the signals of lucky prayers. Both women and  men wear big earrings made from bronze, elephant’s tusk or wood and glass-beads necklaces. Women also wear bronze spiral rings on the ankles.