Jubilant Wrestling Festival

According to the folk song, every year, on January 7 of the lunar calendar, the villagers of Vinh Mo, Cao Xa commune, Lam Thao district gather at the village communal house to attend the Wresting Festival - a unique traditional festival that has been passed down through many generations in the locality.

Vinh Mo Communal House worships the Tutelary God who was a General during the reign of Hung Due King. His birth name was Nguyen Van Ky. He came here to gather people, set residence, and establish Binh Mac Sach - today’s Vinh Mo - Te Le village. Due to his great contribution to assisting the King in defending the country and establishing Binh Mac village, he was awarded the title Dung Luoc Phu Thien General and was worshiped by the people as Duong Canh General Tutelary God.

The annual Vinh Mo Wrestling Festival is a traditional festival to commemorate General Nguyen Van Ky, while also praising the spirit of martial arts and patriotism, encouraging people to train their physical strength to protect their homeland.

According to the elders in the village, every year, to prepare for the Wrestling Festival, from the 6th of the first lunar month, the whole village enthusiastically goes out for a general cleaning of all village roads and alleys to get ready for palanquin procession.

On the morning of January 7, the village holds a ceremony to open the communal house and inaugurate the Wrestling Festival. People of all hamlets well dressed in festive costumes gather at the big communal house. The wrestlers are also fully present. The atmosphere is extremely bustling, with the sound of drums and gongs. At the right zodiac hour, when the local government leader announces the opening of the festival, drums and gongs sound majestically.

The unique feature of the Vinh Mo wrestling festival that cannot be found anywhere else is the pursuit of prizes. Competitions continue until the wrestler has absolutely won and there are no more wrestlers in the fight. Prizes are hung on the flagpole. The winner has to climb up to grab the prize and then runs out of the village as quickly as possible, chased by shouting villagers with sticks and spears in their hands. Only when the prize winner has run out of the village and jumped into the water do the villagers stop chasing him. If the chased person turns around while running out of the village, he will be beaten by the villagers because doing so will bring bad lucks to the villagers during the new year. After chasing the prize, the wrestling competition ends. If everything goes smoothly, the villagers will be very excited, families will celebrate like Tet because they believe that it will have good weather this year, and the crops will be lush.

Mr. Nguyen Tien Tuyen - Secretary of Cao Xa Commune Party Committee said: With the historical and cultural values of Vinh Mo village festival and communal house, every year, the Party Committee and local authorities always pay special attention to to the work of collecting, researching, and restoring the festival’s contents. We hope that with the success of this year’s Wrestling Festival and that the commune has met the criteria for a model new rural commune in 2023, in the year of Dragon 2024, the local socio-economic situation will be developing more and more.

Vinh Ha