TURA, Nov 4: Ushering in the festive mood for the Christmas and the New Year celebrations, West Garo Hills District is set to witness two Garo traditional festivals this month.
The annual 100th Drums Wangala Festival is slated to take place from November 11 to 13 at its new celebration venue- the Wangala A’dam at Chibragre. Earlier the festival used to be held at the Asanang Playground under Rongram Block about 17 kilometres from Tura. The festival since last year was shifted to the new venue at Cjhibragre in view of the Covid-19 pandemic.
It may be mentioned that the Wangala is the harvest festival of the Garos and is being celebrated every year to mark the end of the period of toil in the fields and as an offering to ‘Misi Saljong’- the Garo Sun God of fertility for a good year’s harvest. The beating of 100 Wangala Drums along with rhythmic dance performance by ten different Wangala troupes marks the end of the festival on the last day.
Another traditional festival, the Megong Festival is scheduled to take place in the district from November 18 to 20. The festival which is being organized by Meghalaya Tourism will be held at the Babadam Village Playground.
The three day festival will be marked by various traditional games besides activities like eating competition, brew contest, strongman contest, circus act, fashion show, modern dance troupe, laser and light show, band performances and others.