In Burma, it?s all the rave right now. Shaved heads are so in. Robes too. Just in time for autumn.

The monks have been turning heads all over Burma, strutting up and down runways 1 km long in their savvy-but-simple garb. And they?ve had quite a showing ? 100,000 people came to celebrate the latest from the Alms Collection? in Yangon alone.

The trend has taken hold of even the most poorly dressed and least fashion-conscious of the land. So much so that even the unfashionable army has ordered Light Battalion 77 to take razors to their heads, and purchased 3,000 fashionable maroon monk?s robes for them to adorn. They must have been voted ?tackiest-dressed battalion? last year or something.

But veterans Burma Campaign UK have seen it before. These military types always try to get in on the fun. They turn out to be real party-poopers, though, with all that unrefined chic. Inevitably, they?ll be sneaking all over the runway, cramping all the monk?s style, blowing death instead of kisses into the audience. Any designer can tell you, that kind of behavior really has a way of distracting the models, not to mention the effect it would have on the public opinion surrounding the collection.

If this season?s fall event turns out anything like the Depayin Massacre/Masquerade of 2003, these wannabes are going to end up bringing a little too much firepower and way too much sass, surely crushing the rave that?s taken the country by storm.

I?m no fashion connoisseur but somehow, in Burma imitation seems far from the highest form of flattery.