The Aza festival is a long-standing practice of Pa Co – Ta Oi ethnic community to bid farewell to the old year and welcome the new one while paying respect and gratitude for gods and praying for favorable weather conditions and bumper crops for the upcoming year.

Villagers preparing offerings for the festival.

Traditionally, the Aza festival usually kicks off on the sixth day of the eleventh lunar month and lasts until the 24th day of the twelfth lunar month. In each village of the community, the villagers will choose the day they consider as the “most blessed” on which to celebrate the festival.

The festival includes two types of Aza Kan, which is held annually, and Aza Koonh, which is observed every five years. Thus, the former is celebrated in a simpler way with fewer rituals than the latter.

Offerings to Aza festival include rice, sticky rice, traditional cakes, rooster, pig, duck, goat, plant seeds, and ‘tâng họt’ flowers, which made from bamboo and ‘dzèng’ cloth.

Each household and family in the village hold their own worshipping ritual at home before gathering at the village’s communal house to stage the major ritual of the entire village.

The event was held jointly by the Thua Thien – Hue provincial Department of Culture and Sports, and the People’s Committee of A Luoi district under a project on preserving and promoting the value of Aza festival, which was launched in early December.

The project aims to complete a dossier to recognize Aza festival as a national intangible cultural heritage.

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Source: NDO