Lhasa Festivals

As a beautiful flower of Chinese folkloric culture, Tibetan festival culture is an important component of Tibetan folkloric culture, ancient culture and religious culture. Tibetan festivals have multiple origins and qualities. Though most of them are related to Buddhism, we can still seek for the general look of Tibetan and Chinese cultures and the historical clues of cultural exchange between them.

Tibetan New Year

The establishment of Tibetan New Year has close relationship with usage of Tibetan calendar, which can date back to more than 950 years ago. From then on, it became a survival of the past. Tibetans start preparing for New Year Holiday in Dec of Tibetan calendar. During the process, whole families will infuse barley seeds in basins. On the New Year Eve, every family will present all kinds of foods in front of Buddha images and keep busy preparing deep into the night, so that there will be plentiful food during the holiday. On the first day of the Tibetan New Year (first day of lunar calendar), the first thing Tibetans must do is sending one family member to take a barrel of water home from the river, the first barrel of water in the new year is called auspicious water. Form the second day, relatives and friends begin to visit each other and celebrate the New Year, which will lasts 3 to 5 days. During the festival, people will play Guozhang or Guoxie dance at the squares or open grasslands with the accompaniment of guitars, cymbals, gongs and other musical instruments. Hand in hand, arm in arm, Tibetans dance in a circle while singing following the rhythm by stamping their feet. Children, on the other hand, will fire firecrackers. A happy, harmony and auspicious festival atmosphere will pervade the whole area.

Religious festivals

Ox festival

It derives from Tibetans’ awareness of the importance of ox in agriculture. During their daily labor, they gradually produced strong feeling to ox, and consequently, numerous phenomena of ox culture came into being. Ox was regarded as god and became the best sacrifice for divinities. Then, the Ox Festival finally emerged. It starts from the 15th day of the 8th month in Tibetan year and usually lasts more than 10 days or even one month sometimes, with generally more than 1,000 people. During this process, people will ask “heiba”(wizard) to recite scriptures, play yak horn and kill tens of yaks or over 100 sheep, drinking freely and talking noisily. Because of the high expenses, this large-sized fair was held only once in almost one century.

Moreover, members who take part in Ox Festival share the same blood relationship. So, it is placed among the cultural festivals of ancestors worship.

Great Prayer Festival

It falls on the fourth up to the eleventh day of the first Tibetan month. It is the grandest religious festival in Tibet. Monks of Dreprang Monastery, Sera Monastery and Gaden Monastery will assemble in Jokhang Monastery on the occasion. It dates back to 1049 when Tsong Khapa, the founder of the Gelu sect, held a praying ceremony in Lhasa. Examinations taking form of sutra debates for the Geshe degree, the highest degree in Buddhist theology, were also held. Pilgrims from other places in Tibet crowded to listen to the sermons while others give religious donations. After that, it is continuously enlarged and enriched, becoming a fixed and popular religious festival and lasting until today, with a larger size than is was set up. It will be held on March, 8th, 2011.

Butter Lamp Festival

The grand festival falls on the 15th day of the first Tibetan month, the last day of Great Prayer Festival and it will be held on December, 19th 2011. In the daytime, people will go to monasteries to worship Buddhas and pray. At night, a lamp festival will be held on the Barkhor Street, where there will be lots of shelves filled with colorful and various images such as gods, figures, birds, animals, flowers and trees. Meanwhile, you can also enjoy the puppet show. Thousands of lamps just like the shining stars falling from the sky, which takes on a splendid look.

Saka Dawa Festival

The 15th day of the fourth month in the Tibetan calendar is a day when Sakyamuni was born, achieved nirvana and passed away. It is also a traditional festival for Tibetan people. April in Tibetan calendar is Buddha Month, so it is called “Saka Dawa” in Tibetan. On this day, in accordance with their conventions, Tibetans will dress themselves in their holiday best and assemble at the Dragon King Pool behind the magnificent Potala Palace to celebrate this grand religious festival. After long period of development, it gradually evolves into a mass festival for Tibetans to visit parks in spring and summer and pray for a good harvest in agriculture and animal husbandry. During this festival, some people set up colorful tents; some prepare barley wine and butter tea, families resting beside the pool with great joy. Then young Tibetans dance in a circle while singing following the rhythm by stamping their feet. It will be held on June, 15th 2011.

Bathing Festival

It falls in the first ten days of the 7th month in Tibetan calendar. As a conventional festival in Tibet, it has a long history of seven or eight hundred years at least. Because Tibetans believe July is the best time for bathing.
Shoton Festival.

It is one of grand festivals in Tibet. “Shoton” means yoghurt in Tibetan. The origin of the festival started from the 17th century. According to the rule of Gelu sect of Tibetan Buddhism, the 6th month in Tibetan calendar was the retreat period when monks and nuns of all monasteries were prohibited from going out to avoid stamping on or hurting little bugs. Then, on the 1st day of the 6th month in Tibetan year when the ban was lifted, they went down the hill one after another. And the peasants and herdsmen would serve yoghurt to them.

During the festival, Tibetans, no matter male or female, old or young, will pour into Norbulingka Summer Palace in knots, with colorful bags on back and barley wine barrels in hand. Some will set up tents, put carpet on the ground, and lay out barley wine, dishes and other holiday foods. Horseracing is a favorite activity for Tibetans. It not only provides a good place to assemble and exchange experience in agriculture and animal husbandry in spare time, but also shows the spirit of Tibetans. Consequently, horse racing has become an indispensable activity in almost all the Tibetan festivals that are handed down and spread among the people.

Ongkor Festival

It is a festival for Tibetans to celebrate agricultural harvest once a year. “Ong” refers to field in Tibetan and “kor” rotating. So, “ongkor” is a transliteration, meaning walking round the field.

Ongkor Festival is observed only in farming villages, especially in the countries in middle reaches of Yarlung Tsangpo and the ones besides Lhasa River. It also appears in other places with different names, however. For instance, it is called “Yaji”(means comfortable summer in Tibetan) in Lhatse and Tingri.

On the day, Tibetans will always dress themselves in holiday best and walk around their fields, some carrying colorful flags, some lifting barley and harvest pagoda made of ear of wheat with white hada hanging around, some beating drums and gongs, singing songs and Tibetan operas, some holding the portrait of Chairman Mao. After that, people will set up tents and take barley wines, drinking cheerfully when chatting freely. Moreover, they will also hold traditional activities and contests such as horse racing, yak racing, riding to pick up hada, singing and dancing contest and Tibetan opera contest. It will be held on October 15th-18th, 2011.

Butter Lantern Festival

From Jan 1 to 15 of Tibetan calendar, living Buddha, Geshi and lamas gather at Lhasa for the Butter Lantern Festival and it will be held on March, 19th 2011.On the evening of the festival Barkhor Street will be filled by huge yak-butter sculptures. These lanterns are sculptured from yak butter into images of deities, animals, plants, and human figures. The lights make the whole street bright as in the day and the local people sing and dance during to enjoy the festival.

Palden Lhamo Festival

Palden Lhamo Festival is a religious sacrifice when the faithful disciples worship Tian-Mu (a female Buddha). The monks carry statues of Tian-Mu on their heads to Barkhor Street. On the way many Tibetan people will present hada (a piece of raw silk) to Tian-Mu. After a whole day worship activity, the statues of Tian-Mu will be brought back to Jokhang Temple. It will held on 15th day of the tenth month in the Tibetan calendar and December 10th, 2011.