As usual, on 11st January lunar year(27/2), the Long Tong (Going to the field) festival was solemnly held in ATK Phu Dinh - Dinh Hoa, Thai Nguyen. This was a traditional festival of Tay people, to honour cultural values of Viet Bac region. Long Tong festival was restored 5 years now. This year, tens of thousands locals, tourists, senior people, children, boys and girls joyfully came to the land of the old military base to join the Long Tong Festival.
The Long Tong festival is held in memory of Emperor Shen Nong who manages fields, gardens, livestock and villages. People pray for favourable wind and rain, bumper crop, bountiful livestock, the well to do and village’s peace. The Long Tong includes two parts: rituals and festival. At exact 8am, the festive drum performance was given in a boisterous brouhaha, signalling the beginning of the festival. The crop praying festival of the Tay and Nung people started the rituals. It was held to worship agriculture, land and mountain gods and tutelary spirit of village. Rituals were carried out solemnly with full procedures: The crop praying festival of the Tay and Nung ethnic people from Binh Yen commune, the happiness praying festival of the Dao ethnic minority group from Phu Dinh commune and the long-lived and peaceful life praying festival (Ky Yen) of the Tay ethnic people from Thanh Dinh commune, Dinh Hoa district.
The festive part, following the ritual part, includes traditional folk games, such as five-coloured cloth ball throw, tug-of-war, walking-on-stilts, spin the top, lion dance, martial art performance, blind man’s buff, and shooting with a crossbow. The cloth ball throw and the Tay water puppetry ò Tham Doc village was considered the most attractive and drew most participants.
