Dai "Woba Festival"
"Woba" means "fish gathering" in Dai language. The original intention of the "Woba Festival" is to pray for a bumper harvest in the fishery industry and wish happiness and good luck to the Dai compatriots and people of all ethnic groups. There is another beautiful legend about the Woba Festival. Legend has it that the Jinsha River water monster "Shimojing" harmed the people. In order to save the Dai family, Prince "Qingge" and Princess "Hongmei" led the Dai family's children to fight against "Shimojing". After killing "Shimojing", the two fell into the river due to their injuries and died. They transformed into herring and red fish respectively. This day was the seventh day of the first month of the lunar calendar.
Therefore, every year on the seventh day of the first month of the lunar calendar, Dai children will go to the Jinsha River to welcome Brother Qing and Red Sister back home, singing and dancing, splashing water carnival, killing pigs and sheep, and paying homage to "herring and red fish" with an ancient ceremony. This day is named "Woba Festival", which means "fish gathering" in Dai language.
Many people only know about the Dai Water Splashing Festival. In fact, the Woba Festival is also the biggest festival for the Dai family. On the seventh day of the first month of each year, Dai families from all over Wanbi Township gather together to celebrate this festival. During the festival, we eat authentic Dai cuisine and olive raw materials, wear the best clothes, fire grass tube skirts, and sing and dancing are very lively.
The "Woba Festival" mainly commemorates the fish god and is divided into three stages. On the sixth day of the first month, we pay homage to the fish god, and on the seventh day, we invite the fish god and receive the fish god. Paying tribute to the fish god is the most important ceremony of the Woba Festival. This ceremony must be performed by the most respected elderly people in the village. There are many rituals among them, such as killing chickens and offering sacrifices, placing sacrificial objects, calling souls, and singing sacrificial songs...
Respecting the fish god on the sixth day of the lunar new day is a day when fish and fish god gather together. On this day, fish from the Jinsha River gathered in pairs to the Jinsha River at the entrance of the Gaopingzi River. Dai compatriots living on both sides of the river and the fish god gathered along the Jinsha River to celebrate the beautiful night. On the seventh day, invite the fish god and receive the fish god.
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invites the fish god. During the prayers of the Dai elders, the Dai family wants to invite the "fish god" home to protect the blessings and blessings of the Dai family. They used the prepared wood to carve two fish, wrapped them with red cloth strips or tied them with red thread, put the wooden fish into the river water, and after circling it three times on the Jinsha River, seven handsome Dai boys led the wooden fish, and seven beautiful Dai girls carrying treasure gourds went up the Gaopingzi River, singing while walking until they reached the deep pool under Baishi Rock in Gaopingzi Village.
Passing through each village, the whole village gathered in a smooth place by the river to sprinkle each other with holy water to show their blessings; hand in hand, they danced three rounds of the "Magpie Bath Dance" to pray for their wishes. The celebration reached its climax when the Dai boys led the wooden fish to Gaopingzi and tied it to the fish nest in the deep pool under Baishiyan.
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receives the fish god. When the fish god was invited to Gaopingzi, each household in Gaopingzi held white glutinous rice and fresh eggs in their left hand and a gourd containing auspicious water in their right hand. They invited the fish god to their respective homes and placed it in their homes. Under the shrine or next to the pillow, with the convenience of transportation and smooth information, people of all ethnic groups and tourists from all directions also gathered to the blooming Gaopingzi River and Jinsha River in Panzhihua to celebrate the "Woba Festival" with the Dai people.
Especially on the Woba Festival, Dai women will wear the most beautiful clothes and fire grass tube dresses they made by themselves to celebrate the festival. Over the past thousand years, hard-working and intelligent people have combined ancient Dai costumes with the natural environment of the Jinsha River Valley and invented a special clothing process that mixes fire grass into linen for weaving. The representative clothing is a female head handkerchief, A fire grass tube skirt suit composed of grasshopper clothes, bellybands and tube skirts.
Fire grass skirt is the most popular dress for local women. It is made of fire grass collected by Dai women from the mountains and processed and woven. Wrap a wide and long wool belt around your waist, and wrap your head with a handkerchief made of embroidered on both sides and hanging with a string of bright bubble beads; tie a diamond-shaped embroidered belly on your chest, and wear a tight-fitting "grasshopper clothes", which are short and unbuttonless. In addition to maintaining the characteristics of tight and short-sleeved Dai costumes, the cuffs are relatively wide and embroidered with exquisite patterns. A pair of chicken-heart-shaped embroidered purse hangs on the back of the clothes. The fire grass tube skirt is strong, durable and beautiful. It carries the historical changes of the local Dai people, the development of textile science, the crystallization of life wisdom, love for life and understanding of nature. It is an important cultural carrier.