Nowruz Festival
( 2005-09-13 )

The Nowruz Festival is the traditional festival of theKazak ethnic minority, which lives mainly in theXinjiangAutonomous Region, and Gansu andQinghai provinces (all in Northwest China) and have their own language and system of writing.

The Nowruz Festival is celebrated on the vernal equinox (around March 22) and is regarded by the Kazaks as the New Year. On that day, people pay New Year's visits to each other and hold various activities to welcome the New Year. Before the festival, people will clean up their house and prepare festive food, such as the porridge-like Nowruz Meal and various savory meat and so on.

On this day, the Kazak people are all brightly dressed in their folk costumes to pay New Year visits to each other. They eat the Nowruz Meal and sing Nowruz songs, wishing each other good health and bumper harvest in the coming year. On this day, the heads of sheep are always presented to the elders.

Various activities are held during the festival, such as singing and dancing, wrestling, playing tongue twisters, guessing games, flyingkites, and playing hide-and-seek, and so on. A particularly interesting activity of this festival is a game called Girl Chase.