''Bure'' is the Fijian word for a wood-and-straw

hut A hut is a small dwelling, which may be constructed of various local materials. Huts are a type of vernacular architecture because they are built of readily available materials such as wood, snow, ice, stone, grass, palm leaves, branches, hid ...

, sometimes similar to a

cabin Cabin may refer to: Buildings * Beach cabin, a small wooden hut on a beach * Log cabin, a house built from logs * Cottage, a small house * Chalet, a wooden mountain house with a sloping roof * Cabin, small free-standing structures that serve as i ...

. In its original sense, a ''bure'' is a structure built of anything that comes to hand. The components of a ''bure'' are either stacked together, tied together by rope, or a combination of both methods. Traditionally, ethnic Fijians lived in two types of houses; a ''vale'' was the family house, while men's houses (where circumcised males of the clan met, ate, and slept) were known as ''bures''. Both of these buildings were dark and smoky inside, with no windows and usually only one low door. ''Vales'' had

hearth A hearth () is the place in a home where a fire is or was traditionally kept for home heating and for cooking, usually constituted by at least a horizontal hearthstone and often enclosed to varying degrees by any combination of reredos (a lo ...

pits where the women cooked, and the packed earth floor was covered with grass or fern leaves and then carpeted with pandanus leaf or coarse coconut leaf mats.

Usage of the term "bure" in the tourism industry

Especially in the

Fiji Fiji ( , ,; fj, Viti, ; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी, ''Fijī''), officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consis ...

an tourism industry and its advertisements, the term "bure" is often synonymous with "

bungalow A bungalow is a small house or cottage that is either single-story or has a second story built into a sloping roof (usually with dormer windows), and may be surrounded by wide verandas. The first house in England that was classified as a b ...

" or any other detached hotel or resort structure. While a traditional bure has neither plumbing nor any amenities, and usually no electricity, a tourism bure will be of the same standard as its European or North American equivalent. A tourism bure can range from fairly basic to extremely luxurious.

References

External links

Example of a (rather nice) ''bure''
{{Huts Buildings and structures in Fiji House types