The Gióng Festival and the Hương Pagoda Festival will stop the rituals of stealing and giving away fortunes.

Afternoon of January 16,Mr. Le Huu Manh,Vice Chairman of Soc Son District People's Committee, Head of Soc Temple Festival Organizing Committee informed,Soc Temple Festival 2018 will change the form of thanksgiving ceremony, no longer two processions carrying bamboo flower and betel and areca from Thuong Temple to Mau Temple and Ha Temple.

Mr. Manh said,Changing the form of the thanksgiving ceremony does not affect the tradition of the festival.The organizers have calculated so that the villages can still organize the traditional rituals.bring offerings to Mau Temple, Ha Temple to give thanks

"But the number and method will be decided by the organizing committee. We will not organize a procession to those two temples to avoid looting," said Mr. Manh.

In 2015, the Gióng festival was marred by stampedes and fights over bamboo flowers. To prevent violence, in 2017, the Organizing Committee mobilized nearly 300 police officers, local forces, and youth volunteers to protect the offerings, preventing any fighting.

THowever, Mr. Manh said that mobilizing a large force of people to protect the offerings would lose the meaning of the festival. Therefore, the Organizing Committee was determined to change the form so that it would not need to mobilize too much security force and, more importantly, change the awareness and thinking of the people attending the Gióng festival.

The Giong Festival at Soc Temple (Phu Linh Commune, Soc Son District, Hanoi) is held from the 6th to the 8th of the first lunar month every year. During the festival, there areBamboo flower offering ceremony at the Upper Temple of Ve Linh village (Phu Linh commune). Bamboo flowers are made from bamboo sticks about 50 cm long, about 1 cm in diameter, the bamboo ends are stripped of cotton and dyed to symbolize the horse whip of Saint Giong. After being offered at the Upper Temple, the bamboo flowers will be carried down to the Lower Temple and distributed to festival attendees for good luck.

Ban on giving out fortune at Huong Pagoda

Learning from the incident of looting at the opening day of the Huong Pagoda festival in 2017, the Organizing Committee of the Huong Pagoda festival in 2018 requested the Huong Pagoda Management Board to inform monks not to distribute alms at the festival.

Vice Chairman of My Duc District Nguyen Van Hau explained that the robbery at Huong Pagoda last season was the first time this incident had occurred. Immediately after the incident, the Organizing Committee reported to relevant units and requested the District Buddhist Executive Committee to take corrective measures to remind the monk who distributed the offerings to prevent the incident from happening.

This year's Huong Pagoda Festival will see about 4,500 boats serving tourists. All boats are equipped with license plates, life buoys, trash baskets, and painted the same color.

According to the Vice Chairman of My Duc district, the district has a plan to guide visitors to make offerings and place money in the right place.

My Duc district also assigned Huong Son commune to arrange security forces.Vehicles and classes for people to improve service skills, organize food safety and hygiene, environmental protection work...

Vo Hai