Exploiting the value of games and folk performances to develop tourism. Turning potential into unique experiences to attract tourists.

Therefore, exploiting TCTDDG into a tourism product is necessary, thereby contributing to diversifying tourism products, increasing the experience for tourists, contributing to the socio-economic development of the locality, and at the same time returning to preserve the value of TCTDDG in contemporary life.

The unique crab racing game at Con Chim (Tra Vinh) helps tourists enhance their experience. Photo: Linh Tam

"Message" conveys beliefs and culture

In the treasure trove of folk culture, TCTDDG occupies an important position in creating the traditional cultural appearance of the nation. Not only is it a component that makes up the joyful "festival" in traditional festivals in the form of entertainment, TCTDDG is also a "message" that conveys humanistic values, cultural and historical values, expressing the unique cultural identity of each community, each ethnic group and educating people towards truth - goodness - beauty. At the same time, organizing TCTDDG in early spring festivals in Vietnam also creates attractive factors to attract tourists.

All TCTDDG originate from community cultural activities associated with agricultural production practices that were formed thousands of years ago. Each TCTDDG represents different cultural values. If folk performances are a form of performing arts that reflect the cultural, religious and historical life of the community and are often associated with rituals... then folk games are an indispensable part of the "festival" part of festivals or are played by children every day.

Passed down through many generations, TCTDDG in Vietnam is very diverse, rich and distributed throughout regions, provinces and cities. According to a study by the Institute for Tourism Development Research, the Red River Delta alone has about 60 TCTDDG, popularly known as wrestling, tug of war, human chess, cockfighting, phat robbery, clay cannons, and folk art forms such as quan ho, cheo, chau van, ca tru, water puppetry...

Among them, many of them have been listed as national intangible cultural heritages such as the kite festival of Ba Duong Noi village (Hong Ha commune, Dan Phuong district), the art of water puppetry in Dao Thuc village (Thuy Lam commune, Dong Anh district) of Hanoi; the art of water puppetry and singing drums (Binh Giang district, Hai Duong province)... Many of them have also been recognized by UNESCO as representative intangible cultural heritages of humanity such as the rituals and games of tug of war, then practice of the Tay, Nung, Thai people; the art of xoan singing (Phu Tho)...

However, due to the impact of the wave of rural urbanization and national modernization, the TCTDDGs are at risk of being lost and distorted. Therefore, bringing TCTDDGs into service of tourism development, in addition to the purpose of diversifying tourism products, enhancing the experience for tourists, increasing the attractiveness of destinations to attract domestic and international tourists, also aims to contribute to preserving and promoting the value of TCTDDGs effectively.

The “glue” that binds the community together

In recent years, many localities have collaborated with travel agencies to make TCTDDG an attractive experience in the tour program. The most typical example is the ancient town of Hoi An. Here, in addition to visiting the old town and enjoying the cuisine, visitors can also participate in folk games such as blindfolded pot smashing, singing Bai Choi, pushing sticks, folding coconut leaves... These games attract the participation of many locals and tourists, are the "glue" that binds the community, and at the same time helps visitors understand more about the spiritual life and customs of Hoi An people.

The Mekong Delta is one of the regions that still preserves and brings many folk games into tourism. In Con Chim hamlet (Hoa Minh commune, Chau Thanh district, Tra Vinh province), visitors can return to their childhood with games such as jumping rope, shooting marbles, throwing cans, especially the unique crab racing game. In An Giang, visitors to the Ky Yen festival at Binh Thuy communal house (Binh Thuy commune, Chau Phu district) can immerse themselves in the bustling atmosphere of the boat racing festival or chess games, bamboo cockfighting...

In Hanoi, the festival season lasts for the first 3 months of the year. The festival cannot lack folk games such as wrestling, sack jumping, cockfighting, human chess... Besides, there are performances associated with folk beliefs such as the sitting tug of war at Tran Vu communal house (Thach Ban ward, Long Bien district), the beak pulling game at the Vua Ba temple festival (Xuan Thu commune, Soc Son district), the "prostitute beating the gong" game at the Trieu Khuc village festival (Tan Trieu commune, Thanh Tri district)...

These festivals not only attract local people but also tourists from all over the world. In particular, in the 2025 festival season, for the first time, Zakhar Dzmitrychenka, a Belarusian athlete, "swept" all the village festivals in Hanoi and some neighboring provinces in wrestling competitions, making many curious people follow him to the wrestling arenas.

Sharing the reason for participating in these festivals, wrestler Zakhar Dzmitrychenka said that, in addition to the purpose of interacting with local athletes, he also wanted to immerse himself in the vibrant atmosphere of traditional festivals and learn more about Vietnamese customs and practices. This shows that the potential of festival tourism associated with TCTDDG can be exploited to become an attractive tourism product for domestic and international tourists.

Identify to develop

However, in reality, exploiting the values ​​of TCTDDG to develop tourism and create unique tourism products has not received attention from departments, branches, local authorities, tourism businesses and people.

According to Director of the Asian Tourism Development Institute Pham Hai Quynh, currently, businesses only focus on building tours, festival tourism products, and spiritual tourism, focusing on worship rituals, but pay little attention to guiding tourists to participate in TCTDDG. The reason is that domestic tourists mainly like to go to temples, pagodas, and pagodas to worship, not to "go to festivals". Meanwhile, foreign tourists face many language and cultural barriers to fully understand the meaning of TCTDDG, so it is difficult for them to participate.

Another reason why TCTDDGs are diverse but difficult to develop is because of the overlap in many localities. Research shows that TCTDDGs present in many provinces and cities have similar playing and performing styles, which can easily make tourists feel bored. In addition, the seasonality and promotion of TCTDDGs have not received much attention from localities, causing travel businesses to lack information to build tourism products related to TCTDDGs.

Referring to the role of tourism routes for TCTDDG, Director of Travelogy Vietnam Tourism Company Vu ​​Van Tuyen stated that it is necessary to build themed tourism routes such as "TCTDDG Experience", "Discovering Folk Festivals" or "Folk Culture Education Semester" for tourists, including students. These tourism routes focus on experiencing TCTDDG, learning about the history and significance of each game and performance combined with visiting historical sites to create useful and attractive experiences for tourists.

Dr. Le Thi Minh Ly, Vice President of the Vietnam Cultural Heritage Association, said that it is necessary to research and identify the historical and cultural values ​​and significance of TCTDDG to contemporary life. From there, find ways to explain to tourists, helping them better understand and interact with TCTDDG. This requires the participation of local authorities, travel businesses and the community.

In addition, it is necessary to identify and inventory the TCTDDG, eliminate foreign elements, and only retain the original elements to avoid product duplication between localities. The community must be the one to do this to protect its TCTDDG. Only then can unique products and experiences be created to attract tourists.

To effectively exploit the TCTDDG associated with tourism development, according to many tourism experts, it is necessary to synchronously deploy 4 solutions on: Policy mechanisms; product and market development, tourism promotion; application of science and technology, human resource development; investment, tourism development linkage based on promoting the value of TCTDDG. These are 4 important pillars that not only help promote the value of TCTDDG associated with tourism development but also promote the development of cultural tourism products - one of the important types of tourism according to the orientation of the Vietnam Tourism Development Strategy to 2030.

Source: https://hanoimoi.vn/khai-thac-gia-tri-tro-choi-tro-dien-dan-gian-de-phat-trien-du-lich-bien-tiem-nang-thanh-trai-nghiem-doc-dao-thu-hut-du-khach-696759.html