(VOVWORLD) - The Co Tu ethnic minority group in A Luoi district, Thua Thien Hue province has over 10 traditional festivals. Their Tac Ka Coong Festival worships the deities who look over the village’s mountains, forests, and rivers.
 The reenactment of the Tac Ka Coong Festival of the Co Tu in A Luoi district, Thua Thien Hue province. (: VOV) |
An original Tac Ka Coong Festival had many rites, including erecting a Neu bamboo tree, tethering a buffalo, sacrificing a buffalo, and the Tac Ka Coong rite of making an offering to the mountain gods. Today the buffalo sacrificing ritual has been retired.
In the early morning of the worship day, senior villagers and heads of families and clans start by erecting a Neu bamboo tree, which is a symbol of the village’s great unity and a bridge connecting the villagers and deities. They then tether a buffalo to the Neu tree as an offering to the deities. Boys and girls wearing colorful traditional costumes perform the “Tung Tung Da Da”, a folk dance of the Co Tu.
“The Tac Ka Coong Festival, which is held every three or four years, features all the traditional procedures. In this way the Co Tu tradition will be preserved forever,” said village chief Ho Van Sap in Lam Dot commune.
The Tac Ka Coong Festival includes a ritual to offer the best food to the deities. The village chooses outstanding girls and boys to carry the offerings, which are made from buffalo, cow, goat, pig, and chicken and many kinds of cakes made from fragrant sticky rice.
 The altar to worship deities at the Tac Ka Coong Festival. (Photo: VOV) |
All the different dishes are solemnly arranged on tables to serve to the deities. The villagers thank the deities for giving them peace and sufficiency. They pray to the gods for continuing to protect and bless the villagers with health, luck, prosperity, peace, and happiness.
Ho Thi Tu from the Center for Culture, Information, and Sports of A Luoi district, said, “Two years ago we re-enacted festivals of the Pa Co and Ta Oi ethnic groups. This year, we recreated the Co Tu’s Festival to preserve and promote ethnic cultural values.”
The Tac Ka Coong Festival was re-enacted for the first time at the 2024 Culture, Sports, and Tourism Festival of ethnic groups held in Thua Thien Hue.
“This is the first time I learned about the festival and joined it. Ethnic groups have a rich spiritual and cultural life. I’m very excited,” said Chau Thi Hau, a tourist from Da Nang City.
The Tac Ka Coong Festival shows the life philosophy of the Co Tu, which is to live gratefully, and worship and respect nature and the place where they were born and grew up.