Promoting the value of Long Tong Festival in Dak Nong

Offering trays prepared by people to present at the Long Tong Festival held in Nam Xuan commune, Krong No district, Dak Nong province.

Long Tong Festival, also known as Going to the Fields Festival, is one of the famous festivals of the Tay ethnic group. The festival bears the mark of fertility beliefs, is a religious activity praying for favorable weather, good vegetation, bountiful harvests, and a prosperous life with enough food and clothing.

The festival originated from the Tay community and is often held in the best and largest fields in the village. This is not only the distillation of the cultural quintessence of the ethnic minority community in general, the Tay and Nung ethnic groups in particular, but it is also a process of effort in preserving the ethnic cultural identity of the people, and the solidarity within the ethnic community.

The festival is usually held in early January, the venue is the best and largest fields. Depending on each location, with suitable terrain, neighboring localities can agree to choose different days to organize the festival to create conditions for people to have the opportunity to exchange and interact.

Before the festival, families clean their houses thoroughly and prepare food to serve guests. On the day of the festival, each family prepares a tray of food according to their ability. This is to show off the skillfulness and carefulness of women in housework, cooking traditional dishes such as banh chung, banh day, che lam, banh bong...

On each tray there is a plate of five-color sticky rice. Each tray also has two pairs of balls made of colored cloth, stuffed with sand and cotton, and with colorful tassels. The ceremony to pray for favorable weather and good crops is performed by shamans. The festival is divided into two parts: the ceremony and the festival. The ceremony is organized solemnly.

Offerings are products made by local people to offer, usually each village prepares a tray of offerings including sticky rice, chicken, pork, banh chung, banh khao, seven-color sticky rice... arranged in a row in front of the altar, symbolizing the moon, the sun, yin and yang, expressing the dreams and aspirations for a prosperous life, prosperity of the people, with the wish to pray for favorable weather, bountiful crops, good health for everyone, and prosperity for all things.

When the offerings are ready, the shaman performs a ritual to ask the gods to let the villagers hold a festival, thank heaven and earth, pray to the God of Agriculture, the God of Mountains, the God of Streams... to grant favorable weather, good crops, and happiness for the villagers... After the ritual, the villagers go down to the fields to start farming work, making the first plowing of the year in the field where the festival is held.

At the end of the ceremony, the festival took place with many traditional folk games attracting everyone to participate with unique dances and songs such as lion dance, sli singing, luon singing; traditional games such as stilt walking, stick pushing, grass pulling, tug of war, throwing con, throwing pao, spinning top, bull fighting, etc.

In Dak Nong, the Long Tong Festival is facilitated by the local government for people to organize in the first days of the new year; to create an exciting atmosphere, motivating people to compete in labor production, successfully implementing the local socio -economic development goals of the year.

The Long Tong Festival is held to honor traditional cultural values, create solidarity and unity among ethnic people in the province, contribute to raising awareness of preserving and promoting traditional cultural values of ethnic minorities; create a healthy playground, promote sustainable community tourism development...

Source: https://nhandan.vn/phat-huy-gia-tri-le-hoi-long-tong-tren-dat-dak-nong-post861932.html