Ethnic showcase at Sept 16 joy
Kota Kinabalu: Rallying all tribes and races to celebrate the grand 50th Golden Jubilee celebration of Malaysia is the deep-seated purpose on Sept 16.
Tracing the traditional life styles of Sabah’s ethnic tribes back to their age old roots is high on the programme at the celebration epi-center – Prince Philip Park.
In fact, organisers of this aspect of the events have made the people-centric theme of the celebration so visible that no body who steps into Prince Philip Park on that day can miss it – authentic live-size replicas of the five traditional houses of the interior Muruts – their Lansaran longhouse; the Rungus longhouse of northern-most Sabah; The Bruneian house of southwest Sabah; the Bajau house of northern coastal north and the walai Dusun of Ranau at the foothills of Mt Kinabalu.
This deep touch stuff of the original Borneo culture and peoples is surely going ignite the intense expectations of first time visitors from far-flung parts of the globe who would be curious about every little thing they want to know about this 3rd largest island in the world – who they are, their architectural styles, materials used, functional aspects, who build what, how did they make a living, what do they eat, what do they drink etc.
High curiosity is certain among the waves of tourists from East Asia such as China who will find this traditional ethnic showcase very culturally instructive and lots of picture to take home – and then the word of mouth plus what they can see from pictures about Sabah may spread like wildfire.
But cultural appreciation is not necessarily the exclusive domain of exotic visitors.
Plenty of West Malaysians and Asean people know probably next to nothing who are the people of Sabah.
So, the Golden Malaysia Day celebration can surely be a satisfying day to raise mind, body and spirit, because there will ethnic food and beverages on offer, and surely all the amazing diversity of very distinctive traditional costumes to feast the eyes and ears , that is, all aspects of their senses.
Who have been in charge of putting up this loud ethnic showcase?
The Sri Peloncongan Sabah Sdn Bhd, the Sabah Tourism Board and the Sabah Museum – the operating divisions under the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Environment.
It’s an all out celebration of a 50th year old Malaysia, formed on Sept 16 1963.
Why not?
“The 50th anniversary comes only once in all history, never was, and never again and so all of us should celebrate it,” noted Sitti Damsal, General Manager of Sri Peloncongan Sabah.
Source: Daily Express
