New and more civilized
According to the Department of Grassroots Culture (Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism), the management and organization of festivals in localities are increasingly becoming more organized. Many "hot spots" have gradually cooled down, pushing back negativity, especially at major festivals such as Huong Pagoda, Lim Festival, Gióng Festival at Soc Temple, Tran Temple Seal Opening Festival... This change has been achieved thanks to a series of solutions to ensure safety, health and civility of festivals that have been seriously implemented by local authorities, relic management boards, and festival organizing boards in accordance with the provisions of Decree No. 110/2018/ND-CP dated August 29, 2018 of the Government regulating the management and organization of festivals.
At Huong Pagoda, a civilized and impressive appearance not only "scores points" with tens of thousands of tourists but also affirms the effort to create attraction based on traditional cultural values. Mr. Bui Van Trieu, Head of the Management Board of Huong Son Relics and Landscapes, said: The 2025 Huong Pagoda Festival has the theme "Huong Pagoda Festival - a tourist destination, traditional Vietnamese culture", taking place for 3 months (from February 3 to May 1, 2025). The highlight is the innovations in the organization, with the goal of affirming Huong Pagoda as a tourist destination, traditional culture of the Vietnamese people. From this theme, the Festival Organizing Committee has built a "Traditional Cultural Tourism Week" to honor the values of intangible cultural heritage, traditional folk art, combined with folk games... contributing to preserving and promoting the cultural values of the festival, creating attraction for tourists from all over.
The stations and parking lots are strictly planned, ensuring service quality and prices according to regulations. The management of security, order, traffic safety, and fire prevention and fighting is tightened, ensuring a safe and friendly festival environment. “The relic management board strives to ensure requirements on fire prevention and environmental sanitation on Yen stream. The Huong Pagoda Tourism Service Cooperative is assigned to develop a plan to apply digital technology to management, using QR codes to evaluate visitor satisfaction as well as receive feedback, thereby making timely adjustments. In particular, for cases of disturbing visitors, extortion or having inappropriate behavior, the relic management board and the festival organizing board will remind and handle them strictly,” Mr. Bui Van Trieu shared.
Acknowledging the positive changes at this key festival, Deputy Director of the Hanoi Department of Culture and Sports Pham Xuan Tai emphasized that the management and organization of the Huong Pagoda festival this year has many positive changes. Propaganda work on the historical and cultural values of the relic and festival has been focused, with special attention paid to propaganda on the implementation of the Code of Conduct, pushing back superstition; traffic diversion, landscape decoration, environmental sanitation have many clear changes...
Compared to the same period last year, the number of tourists coming to Huong Pagoda for spring festival is less. However, in the coming days, especially on weekends, the number of visitors is expected to increase. "Service work and service quality have also been improved. The number of boats serving tourists this year is about 4,000, we are committed to ensuring absolute safety for tourists, even during peak days, when the number of visitors is up to 60,000 - 70,000 people..." - Mr. Trieu said.
Along with the Huong Pagoda Festival, one of the festival destinations that is considered to have a new look is the Dong Da Mound Festival. This year's celebration of the 236th anniversary of the Ngoc Hoi - Dong Da victory has a new look, with the highlight being the art program "Dong Da - Golden History - Firm Future" performed in the form of semi-real scenes combined with modern 3D mapping technology. Not only is it a space to honor traditional values and pay tribute to ancestors, the new look has made the Dong Da Mound Festival truly an impressive, civilized destination that attracts tourists.
Honoring tradition, pushing back negativity
The clear change in the festival picture in recent years is the element of traditional cultural identity that is increasingly honored and spread. Coming to the Trieu Khuc Village Festival (January 9-12), visitors cannot help but be delighted with the image of boys dressed as girls dancing "con dy danh bong". The danh bong dance is extremely liberal, decisively strong but also very soft and flexible, a traditional cultural feature that cannot be found anywhere else. "Con dy danh bong" is one of the 10 ancient folk dances of Thang Long land. Therefore, the Trieu Khuc Village Festival is considered to still retain the most pristine features of the traditional festival, bearing the character and spiritual beauty of the thousand-year-old capital.
Also an interesting "meeting place" in early spring, Sai Temple Festival (Thuy Lam Commune, Dong Anh District) has attracted tens of thousands of locals and tourists to come and live in a unique atmosphere. The "soul" of the festival is the "fake king procession" custom. In the sound of excited cheers, thousands of locals and tourists surrounded and followed the palanquins carrying the king, lord and the palanquin carrying the mandarins. The unique "fake king procession" custom was vividly recreated to commemorate King An Duong Vuong who built Co Loa citadel in the past. The group of locals, delegates and tourists followed the procession from Thuy Loi communal house to Sai Temple, a distance of about two or three kilometers filled with bustling sounds and exciting emotions of early spring.
In Nam Dinh, the Tran Temple Seal Opening Festival 2025 is also an attractive destination in the early spring in the North. According to the Management Board of the Tran Temple - Thap Pagoda relic, the organization of the Tran Temple Seal Opening Festival not only carries traditional cultural values and spiritual elements but also has profound historical education, demonstrating the nation's morality of remembering its source when drinking water. The festival program includes a solemn ritual part and a vibrant festival part, imbued with traditional cultural identity, focusing on activities such as the Ngoc Lo palanquin procession; water procession, fish sacrifice; incense offering ceremony, seal palanquin procession and seal opening...
Besides the positive changes, there are still images of crowds fighting for fortune at some festivals. The focus of attention this year is on festivals that carry messages and beliefs through lucky rituals such as praying for a son at the Duc But Festival (Phu Lien village, Dong Tinh commune, Tam Duong district, Vinh Phuc province); Da Cau Robb Phet Festival (Ban Gian commune, Lap Thach district, Vinh Phuc); Giang Bong Festival (Trung Ha commune, Yen Lac district, Vinh Phuc province). The common record at these festivals is the situation of crowds jostling and pushing each other to fight for fortune and pray for luck.
At the Hien Quan Phet Festival (held on January 12-13), after 7 years of not beating the phet, local people regret that the part that creates the soul and unique identity of the festival has not been held. Hien Quan people consider the festival as their own Tet holiday, but without the phet beating, the atmosphere of the Hien Quan festival is much quieter. "Although the festival has many parts, each part is imbued with traditional cultural identity, for Hien Quan people, perhaps the most anticipated part is the phet beating. To ensure safety and civilization, this part has not been included in the festival for many years, the children of the homeland are extremely regretful, many people do not return to their hometown to attend the festival anymore" - Mr. Bui Phuc Khanh, an elder from Hien Quan, expressed.
To prepare for the 2025 Phet Hien Quan Festival, from the end of 2024, the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Phu Tho province coordinated with the People's Committee of Tam Nong district to organize a scientific workshop "Hien Quan Phet Festival - Awareness, value and management and organization solutions". Experts and managers affirmed that there is no need to discuss the traditional value of the Phet Festival, but the difficulty lies in finding a solution for the phet fighting scene to ensure safety.
The problem in Hien Quan has also been raised in many festivals and before the harmonious "answers" were given, there were many considerations from local authorities, managers and experts. The public must not have forgotten the chaotic images that happened at the Gióng Festival in Sóc Temple, the Trần Temple Festival (Nam Định)... To get the final answer, the Gióng Festival Organizing Committee of Sóc Temple sought a solution to disperse bamboo flower fortunes to villagers and tourists, eliminating the hot spot of bamboo flower fortune stealing. The Trần Temple Seal Opening Ceremony moved the time to open the seal early on the 15th day of the first lunar month, which also overcame the situation of jostling and trampling to steal seals at night.
Promoting traditional values, creating beautiful and impressive images at festivals is also the goal, so that each festival becomes an attractive destination for tourists from all over the world.
Source: https://hanoimoi.vn/no-luc-xay-dung-hinh-anh-le-hoi-an-tuong-van-minh-gia-tang-gia-tri-diem-den-tao-suc-hut-ve-du-lich-693249.html
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