Tourists participate in the Ông Pagoda festival. - VNA Photo

ĐỒNG NAI – Đồng Nai Province celebrated the Ông Pagoda festival 2024, an occasion for people to worship and admire the forefathers who contributed to expanding and building the land of Biên Hòa – Đồng Nai.

The festival, which lasted from February 18 to 22, also shows the beauty of cultural exchange of ethnic communities in the locality.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism listed the Ông Pagoda festival as a national intangible cultural heritage.

A member from the Organising Committee places lanterns into Đồng Nai River. - VNA Photo

​The festival welcomed many international tourist groups and domestic tourists. The festival carried out activities such as the Nghinh Thần (Welcoming Deity) ceremony, the ceremony of worshipping the gods and releasing lucky balloons into the sky, the praying for peace ceremony, and the Flower Lanterns Festival.

Other activities in the festival were an art programme celebrating the party and spring, a martial arts performance, folklore games, a dragon–lion dance performance, Southern đờn ca tài tử programme, and a Việt Nam – China exchange through calligraphy.

The Organising Committee transported flower lanterns by ferries into the middle of Đồng Nai River. After the lanterns floated downstream, the Committee directed small boats and ferries to pick up all the lanterns and burn them for the sake of environmental protection.

Ông Pagoda was built in 1684 next to Đồng Nai River and was the first Chinese pagoda in the Southern region, marking a milestone in the relations between the Vietnamese and Chinese communities in Biên Hòa – Đồng Nai. - VNS

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