Sunday, November 12, 2017

Your barong is wrong


In comments elsewhere someone said this shirt is called a barong and in my world that's just funny right there.

Apparently it's a dress shirt on par with tuxedo in the west. And that's why all the diplomats wore them at their meeting.

No. They did it to be agreeable and to make the boss look good. They all discussed what if Trump is wearing one then they agreed to comply. They had to have agreed to this. Or else they would be all different types, most would be white, others with colors, different degrees of elaboration, different collars. Can you imagine all those high level people on the phone, "So what are you going to wear tonight?" 

I'm trying to imagine the conversation Trump had with his tailor. I'm trying to imagine Trump wearing the shirt provided to him. 

I'm imagining all the diplomats scrambling to an agreement about wearing the same style and same color, same shade of shirt.

Instead I cast back to childhood. Mum telling me constantly, every single day, "You buttoned your shirt wrong." I'd look down and the tips didn't match. How does that keep happening? How does she keep noticing something so tiny. I'd start at the bottom and work up. And get it wrong every time. And then have to do the whole thing all over again. And often get it wrong again.

Every time.

I bought seven shirts from Nordstom and I hate them already. I'm having a devil of a time with the buttons. I feel like I'm five years old all over again, matching the bottom tips again to start out, double and triple checking again, then my klutzy fingers cannot push the little buttons through the holes. My shirt is a wrinkled mess by the time I'm done buttoning it up. And it takes such a 

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I hate buttoning those shirts.

And I hate it so much the shirts don't get worn. They just hang there.

And when I do wear them everyone who knows me freaks out like I'm putting on a fashion show.

Instead of slumming it with knits like I usually do.

My oder brother was such a lazy dresser he'd only unbutton the top two buttons then treat the shirt as a pullover. He'd toss it across the room then wear the same shirt the next day.  Like Trump's barong. 

I bet Trump throws away his barong.

I said "barong" just because it's funny. 

6 comments:

Trooper York said...

Is it the man equivalent of a "sarong?"

Trooper York said...

My wife always yells at me that I have my shirts or sweaters wrong.

Men don't care about fashion.

The Dude said...

Two sarongs don't make a right. That joke does not work with barong. Put down the barong, you are doing it barong, barongo, Bunkie!

ken in tx said...

The full name is Barong Tagalog. It is essentially a long sleeve guayabera shirt.

ricpic said...

Trump's barong appears, to my eyes at least, to be a button-down barong; which I'd be willing to bet the original or traditional barong is not, button-down that is.

AllenS said...

You can't screw the buttons up on Trump's barong. Slip over model. I'd wear on of those.