The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The annual Thimphu Tshechu sees thousands of spectators dressed in their best formal clothing. The bright patterned and newly tailored kiras and ghos add to the festive colours.
Tshechu is the time when tailoring shops do brisk business. Almost all tailoring shops in the city are busy cutting and sewing stacks of orders.
Some of the tailoring shops that spoke to this paper said they are able to earn enough money to pay rent and salaries to staff, unlike other dry months when they are barely surviving.
Talking to one of the toiling tailors in the heart of Thimphu town, Yeshey Selden, 37, said that she started getting Tshechu orders from her customers a week before the Tshechu festival.
“Business goes well during Tshechu festival and the order I received this time around is comparatively more than last Tshechu,” she said.
Orders to tailor brocades tegos and silk wonjus, silk kiras and ghos, for both old and young, come in bulk in the shops.
Yeshey said that people look for the tailoring shops that offer quick service and quality work. One of the quickest tailoring services,Druk Tshemzo Enterprise located at Changjalu shared the same experience regarding the customers demanding their outfits to get ready within a stipulated time period.
One of the employees with the tailoring firm, Tshomo, 29, said that Tshechu is the best time for the tailoring shops to work hard and earn a good income. At this time most of the shops can fetch a minimum of Nu 4,000 in a day, which is more than normal amount of order they get in ordinary days.
Tshomo said that normally they get only Nu 1000 or less worth of business in a day.
She said her normal timings are from 9 am till 6 pm, but and during Tshechu, she work overtime till 10:30 pm.
Meanwhile Cheki, 28, shared that when it comes to her tailoring works, orders are more when it comes to skirt kira and fitting tego, and the number of orders she has started to receive this weekend is more.
“I have employed extra number of staff this time around for which we can now take more number of orders, and this festival with more number of orders is actually good for us,” she said.
For now every tailoring shop is found working into late hours to meet the deadline.
Tshechu, which is celebrated on the tenth day of the Bhutanese Calendar, also means good business for textile and cloth shops. There are many that purchase silk and brocade to jazz up their outfits.
