Across the street from my new house is a laundrette of sorts. Those giant blue things hanging on the line are boubous, the traditional (and everyday) dress of Mauritanian men. The come in both blue and white, and some have fancy embroidery on them. They are sort of like wearing a big sheet with a hole in the middle for your head. Boubous tend to billow when one walks and Mauritanian men spend a lot of time folding the boubou over their shoulders or gathering it behind their back. I've been told that boubous were banned from government offices because people kept getting them caught on computer equipment, but I've been unable to verify the story.
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