NOVELTY ABOUNDS IN THIRD NORTHWESTERN FOOD AND CULTURAL SPHERE FESTIVAL

On August 10, the 2019 Northwestern Food and Cultural Sphere Festival will be officially inaugurated at SunWorld Fansipan Legend complex and a variety of quintessential traditions, foods and festivities, not to mention best delicacies a highland has to offer.

As usual, when buckwheat flowers start draping the whole scenery in tender purple and the rice liquor grows sweeter and denser, artisans from across the Northwest, native lads and lassies and visitors from all walks of life rush to the Fansipan and revel in the Northwestern Food and Cultural Sphere Festival. Here, an authentic highland lifestyle is brought back to life by the locals and Sun World Fansipan Legend at the highland marketplace in the Fansipan cable car departure terminal.

Lasting around one month by September 10, 2019, it’s the third year the festival is held by Sun World Fansipan Legend in order to conserve, promote and honor the core cultural quintessence of the Northwest and also the first time the Northwestern Food and Cultural Sphere Festival is held at a larger scale to embrace novel and authentic festivities and experiences unseen in previous seasons.

Entering a welcome gate shaped like piling Hmong horns, visitors may feel topsy-turvy at the sight of barrels of liquor tied with lovely red ribbons, signifying a great feast on highlands. The passion yielded comes from the fulfilling journey throughout the “miniature Northwest” adorned with a mingled palette of local colors. Flamboyant frilled skirts, Hmong horns and highland markets are condensed well in shows every Friday and Saturday morning. Traditional dances warm up the spring breezes of the festival, while visitors are delighted with melodious horn tunes, mating chants or pair dances… which are all part of the core Northwestern treasure, and have long sank into oblivion in far flung hamlets.

More than meeting the eyes and the mouth in fascinating rituals, visitors are also involved in the making of rice buns, green baby rice or sticky rice… and mingle in the abundance of mortal joys. The locals are honest and genuine. They still make the liquor as they did for centuries, from Thanh Kim hull liquor, Sapa corn liquor, hawthorn liquor, Ta Van red plum liquor or Sim San liquor… to herbal beverages such as artichoke liquor, creat roots or Ngoc cau mushrooms… are brewed and baked well, so that the best elixir is made to treat all visitors.

In every Northwestern food festival, visitors always feel free to explore out loud hundreds of delicacies that are prepared by the locals themselves. More particularly, this year, a giant pot of offal hotpot along with pork sausage, sticky rice and hung dried buffalo meat will be set up by local “chefs” right at the highland marketplace, making it the most desirable and enchanting festivity of the year in sapa. In the frosty chills, to sip some prickly liquor from a bamboo cup, taste the fatty offal hotpot, smoky, meaty hung dried buffalo meat and hear the echoes of mating chants and lingering horn tunes, one may find himself attached to the core and under the spellbound of the northwest.

The 2019 Northwestern Food Festival also attracts visitors to the local lifestyle with genuine events and a string of uplifting folk games, including stick pushes, single wired bridge walk, pole dance or stilt walk… so that visitors feel barely able to get away and can win some great gifts on the site.

Also in the opening ceremony, Sun World Fansipan is due to secure the best surprise to visitors and the locals alike as it sets a Vietnamese record as the pole dance with most participants ever: 600 pole shakers and 10,000 pole dancers. The magnificent pole dance not only serves as the background to fuel the joys of the day but also cements the infectious breezes of vibrant festive mood and makes it so one of a kind in the “nine clouds town”.

Beside food events and signature art and cultural performances, there are also at Sun World Fansipan Legend a show “Dance on the Clouds” show bestowed upon visitors at an unheard and unseen scale. The show is quite characteristic of the Northwestern essences and meditative core values, in the mountainous background of mist capped peaks of the Fansipan, making it truly a sight of a lifetime that any visitors may wish to marvel and admire.

In addition, Sun World Fansipan Legend is also a particularly meaningful destination for the Vesak ceremony and its ensuing filial piety rituals. It’s because the sacred Fansipan has for long been known for its colossal religious compound of magnificent constructions, in particular the tallest Grand Amitabha Statue of Vietnam where the priceless sarira of Buddhist monks. It is thus regarded among followers to be a must-visit of their lifetime to actually absorb the serenity and peace of mind that pervade the cloud wrapped surroundings.

Seeking for the Northwestern Food and Cultural Sphere Festival, taking over the sacred Fansipan and enjoying numerous experiences atop are some rewarding pursuits at SunWorld Fansipan as a great destination for visitors in autumn, the best time to explore the northwest.