Saint Giong Festival recognised as world’s intangible cultural heritage

The UNESCO Intergovernmental Committee in its 5th meeting session from November 15-19 in Kenya’s City of Nairobi is examining nominations for new Intangible cultural heritages. Accordingly, at 18:20 of Nov.16 (local time), Vietnam’s Saint Giong Festival of Phu Dong and Soc Temples was officially recognised as an intangible cultural heritage of humanity.
The festival is the third world’s heritage of Hanoi beside 82 Van Mieu’s stone stelae recognised as world documentation heritage and Thang Long imperial citadel recognised as cultural heritage. That Hanoi owns three world heritages would be a big pride of Hanoians, especially on the occasion of 1000th grand anniversary of Thang Long – Hanoi.
It was reported that under the direction of the Prime Minister and the National Steering Committee for 1000th Anniversary of Thang Long – Hanoi, Hanoi municipal People’s Committee has co-ordinated with Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Viet Nam National Commission for UNESCO in preparing Saint Giong Festival’s profile to submit to UNESCO.
The new intangible heritages in 2010 comprise of 6 crafts, 12 celebrations, 6 folk knowledge, 20 healing techniques and 3 culinary heritages.
Translated by Truyen Phuong (TITC)