The Long Tong Festival, also known as the “down to the field” festival, is an important ritual at the beginning of the new year for the Tay and Nung ethnic groups. This festival involves offerings to the God of agriculture deity in hopes of ensuring a fruitful harvest, abundant livestock, and lush vegetation. Additionally, the wish for peace and prosperity for all villagers is expressed.
1. Origin and Significance of the Long Tong Festival
Origin of Long Tong festival
Numerous tales recount the origins of the Long Tong festival, each deeply rooted in local lore and tradition. For instance, the “Story of the Falling Rain Waterfall” hails from the annals of the Chiem Hoa district, but variations abound across different locales, each narrative intricately woven with characters integral to the fabric of community life.
These figures may have served as guardians of villagers or custodians of crops, their passing elevating them to the status of revered deities worshipped by indigenous communities.
These narratives imbue the Long Tong festival with a sacred aura, prompting observances of worship at communal houses, temples, and shrines. Across diverse regions, the Tay people pay homage to various gods, united in collective reverence.
Some locales venerate celestial beings and earth deities, while others extol human figures turned divine. Yet, all these deities share a common purpose—to bestow upon the Tay people blessings of abundance, serenity, joy, and bountiful harvests.
Significance of the Long Tong Festival
The essence of the festival lies in its profound significance: a time to beseech for fortune, rainfall, and the harmonious balance of yin and yang, fostering the proliferation of life among animals. It serves as a poignant expression of each individual’s aspirations for prosperity and joy.
Moreover, the festival serves as a nexus for convergence, cultural interchange, and emotional communion, fostering greater religious comprehension and solidarity among diverse communities.
Through the festival, we aspire to fulfill the populace’s yearning for cultural and spiritual fulfillment, kindling a sense of pride in our national heritage. It provides a fertile ground for the cultivation of cultural activities, artistic expressions, and traditional games, thereby nurturing the evolution of our clans and communities.
2. Preparations for the Long Tong festival
In preparation for the revered and traditional Long Tong festival, villages undertake meticulous arrangements. Firstly, they must designate a spacious and level field situated centrally, ideal for the ceremonial plowing paths and festivities.
Additionally, a man of strong character, esteemed morality, widespread trust, and past business success is selected. A splendid plow adorned with colored paper is coupled with a robust buffalo to initiate the inaugural plowing of the new year.
Prior to the festival day, every household diligently cleanses their dwellings and thoroughfares while abundantly preparing delectable fare, especially local delicacies, to warmly welcome visiting kinfolk and guests.
Upon the Long Tong festival’s arrival, in the fields of village, where the festivities unfold, each family contributes to a communal feast according to their means.
The offering tray brims with boiled chicken, pork, banh chung, and red and yellow sticky rice, symbolizing celestial bodies, dualities, and aspirations for a flourishing life, exuding the jubilation of the attendees.
Moreover, the feast tray serves to showcase the resourcefulness and culinary expertise of women in households, featuring traditional delicacies such as che lam, banh chung, and banh giay, among others.
Traditionally, each tray bears a colorful floral-shaped cake and is supplemented by two shuttlecocks crafted from colored fabric, filled with sand and cotton, adorned with vibrant tassels.
3. Special Features of the Long Tong Festival
Cultural festivals in Vietnam are distinguished by their ceremonial and organized activities.
Ceremonial Section
The Long Tong Festival is a significant traditional event for the local people, meticulously organized in vast fields to pray to the “Thần Nông” (god of agriculture) and other deities for blessings and a prosperous harvest in the new year. The festival includes rituals such as offering incense and paying respects to the deities, demonstrating the villagers’ reverence.
During the ritual of “down to the field,” robust and virtuous men, skilled in farming, accompanied by the strongest buffaloes, are chosen to plow the first furrows for the new crop season. This selection symbolizes the auspicious start of a productive rice cultivation season.
Festival Section
After the main ceremonial section in the fields, the Long Tong Festival transitions into a lively fair featuring various traditional games and activities. These activities showcase the unique cultural traits of the Tay and Nung ethnic groups, including spinning tops, tug-of-war, swings, lion dances, martial arts performances, and traditional singing and dancing.
One of the most amusing games is spinning tops, which attracts both locals and foreign tourists. According to folk beliefs, successfully spinning a colorful top through a heart-shaped target brings luck and prosperity to the village in the new year.
Young Tay and Nung men and women also participate in tug-of-war competitions or showcase their skills in traditional singing. All these activities contribute to creating a lively and vibrant atmosphere.
4. Impressive Specialties of the Long Tong Festival
During the Long Tong Festival, feasting customs vary from one locality to another, shaping the unique cultural tapestry of each community.
In some areas, like the whole commune, a singular communal feast known as the “cai” feast is orchestrated by the Festival Organizing Committee. This grand feast, replete with roasted pig, boiled chicken, five-color sticky rice, banh chung, banh day, and sweet soup, serves as a centerpiece, symbolizing abundance and prosperity. Elaborate paper decorations, resembling flower and fruit branches, bedeck the surroundings, evoking imagery of golden and silver trees.
Alternatively, certain locales opt for a more decentralized approach, hosting multiple feasts as offerings. Each feast, representative of a family within the commune, is laden with essential elements such as pig heads, incense bowls, sticky rice dishes, cups, chopsticks, and local delicacies.
These feasts, steeped in tradition, serve as tokens of gratitude and reverence to the deities presiding over fields, livestock, and poultry, beseeching for bountiful harvests and harmonious lives.
At smaller-scale “long cage” festivals organized by individual hamlets or clusters of adjacent hamlets, the emphasis shifts to familial or clan feasts. For instance, in the upper and lower Ban Bang hamlets of Ly Quoc commune (Ha Lang), over 100 households meticulously prepare their offerings on the 3rd day of Tet annually.
These offerings, crafted from the fruits of their labor—be it boiled chicken, fried pork belly, fried fish, banh chung, banh xeo, or other delectable dishes—are presented at the Earth Cong and Tutelary God temple as a gesture of appreciation and supplication for prosperity and abundance.
Following the ceremonial rites at the earth temple , the community proceeds to the fields at the base of “Phja Ran” mountain, aptly named the god mountain. It is here, amidst the natural splendor, that the festival unfolds.
The belief in the Mountain God’s benevolence permeates the festivities, with prayers for auspiciousness in labor and agricultural yields resonating throughout the gathering.
Thus, the “Long Tong” Festival, with its array of feasts and rituals, serves as a testament to the enduring bond between humanity and the natural world, bridging the temporal with the divine.
5. Acivities in the Long Tong Festival
The Long Tong Festival is a unique cultural event for the Tay and Nung ethnic groups in northern Vietnam provinces. Here are some useful tips for foreign tourists attending this festival:
Activities in the Long Tong festival encompass flag processions, lion dances, stilt walking, puppet shows, cockfighting, swinging, martial arts dancing, tug of war, stick pushing, crossbow shooting, and then singing. Each of these traditional games deeply reflects the talent and yearning of the Tay people towards supernatural entities.
In the ancient Tong Tong Festival, sli and luon singing were essential components. During the evening, young boys and girls engage in call-and-response singing to invoke blessings for bountiful harvests and extend well-wishes to the villagers. The fluid and profound lyrics serve as both New Year’s greetings and agricultural advice, embodying folk wisdom regarding seasons and aspirations for a fruitful harvest.
- The Long Tong festival‘s first highlighted game is Ném Còn, a central tradition. In the heart of a vast field, an apricot tree is erected, standing 20-30 cm tall, serving as a pillar. Atop the arched column, measuring 60 cm in diameter, are two characters, representing the moon and sun. Failing to strike the circle during the festival brings discontent among the villagers, as it’s believed that tearing the paper within the circle ensures prosperity in business for the year.
- Additionally, the Rice Transplantation contest garners considerable attention from participants. Each village and commune selects the most agile, skillful, and talented women to compete in this event.
- Moreover, the Long Tong Festival serves as a romantic rendezvous for young boys and girls, who express their affection through sweet “then” and “sli” songs. This festival provides a comprehensive insight into the cultural life of the Tay and Nung people, as well as other ethnic minority communities in the Northern mountainous regions. Recognized as a national intangible cultural heritage, the festival plays a pivotal role in regional tourism development and the preservation of highland cultures and traditions.
In recent years, there has been increased attention to the cultural and spiritual quality of the Tay and Nung ethnic communities. The result is the Long Tong Festival, a traditional cultural symbol of the Tay and Nung people, being organized on a larger scale with a stronger cultural essence. This not only helps preserve and promote folk cultural values but also contributes to enhancing community solidarity and ethnic pride.
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