Pa -Os are the second largest ethnic group in Shan State, after of course the Shan themselves.

Their
homeland tends to correspond with the most visited part of Shan State, the Kalaw, Pindaya and Inle lake
region, although the Pa-O are also found east past Taunggyi and south into Kayah State. A sub-group,
the Lowland Pa-O, lives in Mon State around Tha Ton.

Ethnically and linguistically the Pa-O are of Tibeto-Burman origin and thus related to the Karen people,
as opposed to their neighbours, the Palaung, who are of Mon-Khmer stock, and the Akha and Lisu
groups of Sino-Tibetan origins. As such they are likely to have inhabited these regions for longer than Tai
groups such as the Shan themselves with ethnologists estimating their migration to date from some
1,000 years ago.

Clothing includes men and women clothes and including jewellery. Pa-O men wear baggy trousers and
black and dark blue jacket called “taite-pown “(Burmese traditional coat) with white vest. Then, they
wear colorful turbans and their traditional bag called “Taung Po”. Pa-O wear mostly black or dark blue
and indigo color. The reason they wear dark color is that this color absorbs heat, it also can protect from
cold weather and it is hardly to get stains as well. Thus, black and indigo are Pa-O ethnic color. As they
wear the same colors together, it is seen as there is lack of competition over exposing individuals’
wealth.

Pa-O traditional dress is highly distinctive and women clothing is significant from other ethnic groups.
Since Pa-O ethnic group believed that they descended from a father called Zawgyi, a Burmese folk super
naturalist as well as alchemist, and a mother dragon, the way Pa-O women dress themselves resembles
to a female dragon. There are five different kinds of clothes including turbans. They are black or dark
blue colored dress, long sleeve blouse, a longyi and a long-wide trouser with wrap-around skirt.
Moreover, women with wealth wear one or two golden head-pins: one the sharp head-pin similar to a
banana bud portrays the dragon’s head and the other round head-pin with the size of a beetle nut
depicts dragon’s eye. Golden head-pins are polished with bronze. Also, they wear a bag called “Taung-
Po” or a basket called “Pawh”. Although they wear dark colored clothes, their minds are as pure as
white.

Pa-O villages tend to be located at lower altitudes than neighbouring groups, and villages are usually
relatively affluent with tea, coffee beans, corn, vegetables, avocado and pear as well as rice being
cultivated on fertile Shan Plateau land. Originally animist, the majority of Pa-O are now Buddhist, with
remaining Christian and animist minorities.