.Top 10
World Festivals
Chinese New Year :All over China, February 3rd
Dragons,
dancers and all sorts else, this is China's top celebration and is great all
over the country including Hong Kong. Beijing tends to have the biggest
celebrations which go on for fifteen days after the dawn of a new lunar year,
culminating in the Yuan Xiao Festival (Lantern Festival) on the Final day.
Rio Carnival :Rio de Janeiro, Brazil;March 4th to 8th
The
Biggest Party on Earth? Quite possibly. More than 2 million people hit the
streets every day with stunning displays, raunchy dancing and samba beats the
main theme. For backpackers in South America, the Rio Festival is an almost
rites of passage and many even plan their trips around it. Be sure to sort
accommodation out in advance if you’re planning on coming to Rio during the
Carnival.
Songkran Water Festival: Bangkok, Thailand; April 12th to 14th
Hit the
world’s most famous backpacker street, the Kao San Road in mid April for some
happy splashing. The only certainty is you will get wet! The dates are now
fixed but the festival is designed to coincide with the astrological New Year
in many South Asian calendars. Festivities take place all over the country and
foreigners are a popular target for many young Thais!
Glastonbury
Festival: Somerset, UK: June 22nd to 26th
Biggest
music festival in the world featuring hundreds and hundreds of artists from a
range of different genres. Headliners this year include Muse and Gorillaz. It
is so much more than a music festival however with many varied and often weird
areas to keep you entertained such as Shangri-La, a nighttime wonderland that
changes its theme every year.
EXIT Festival: Novi Sad, Serbia, July 7th to 10th
Stunning
setting in an ancient fortress as rock meets electro with devastating
consequences! The festival started in the summer of 2000, with a largely
political undertone as form of protest against former Yugoslav President
Slobodan Milosevic. Nowadays it’s all about Europe’s top electronic music and
the atmosphere is sensational.
Horse Racing Festival: Nagchu &
Litang, Tibet; August
10th to 16th
Locals
display some stunning skills on horseback while traditional songs and dance
provide the backdrop. The two villages in Chinese ran Tibet attract horsemen
from all over the province and across Southern China. They come to trade goods,
celebrate and race each other.
Burning Man: Black Rock Desert, Nevada USA, August 29th to September 5th
Burning
Man is a pretty bizarre affair and gets its name from the traditional burning
of a wooden man on the Saturday of the festival. It attracts around 50,000
people each year and is something of an experimental community based on several
key principles such as radical inclusion and self-expression.
Oktoberfest :Munich,
Germany, September
17th to October 3rd
Lots of
great beer to be drank and fun drunken times to be had during the Oktoberfest
in South Germany. It is easily the world’s biggest and best beer festival. The
Oktoberfest is about a carnival atmosphere, a huge variety of beer tents, lots
of seriously drunk people and many lederhosen-wearing natives. All in all, it’s
pretty good fun!
Bon Om Tuk: Phnom
Penh, Cambodia, 9th
to 11th November
Cambodia's
biggest festival celebrates the change in current of the Tonle Sap River. It
features spectacular long boat races and is a lively and colourful affair.
Sadly it is also occasionally tragic with almost 400 people getting crushed to
death during a stampede in 2010.
Whirling Dervishes
Festival: Konya, Turkey, 12th to 17th December
Over a
million gather to witness the stunning dance spectacle which is many centuries
old. In terms of sheer numbers it is by a distance one of the biggest in the
world and rivals some of the major religious festivals. Many visitors find it
an intensely spiritual experience.
