Thursday, March 26, 2009

The World's Wackiest Holidays ( MUST SEE THIS INFO )

Inazawa, Japan: Hadaka Matsuri, The Naked Festival. Hidden somewhere in the midst of all these men in loincloths is one fully naked man. Touching him is believed to bring good luck and happiness.CAN YOU FIND YOURSELF?

Lopburi province, Thailand: The Monkey Buffet. Every year, all of the province's approximately 600 monkeys are invited to eat fruits and vegetables during an annual feast held in honor of Rama, a hero of the Ramayana, who, it is said, rewarded his friend and ally, Hanuman the Monkey King, with the fiefdom of what is now Lopburi.

Lopburi province, Thailand: The Monkey Buffet. Organizers of the annual monkey buffet use more than 3,000 kg of fruits and vegetables for the festival.

Brockworth, England: Cheese Rolling Festival. In a dangerous tradition dating back to Roman times, competitors from all over the world run up a hill and then chase a 7 kg round cheese back down. The first who gets to it, keeps it.

Sabucedo, Spain: Rapa Das Bestas. Since the Bronze Age, Galicians have been taming wild horses. On the first weekend of the month of July, hundreds of wild horses are rounded up by expert stockbreeders, known as agarradores, then trimmed and groomed.

Reading, England: Festival of Falconry. Bird-of-prey handlers from Turkmenistan hold falcons at the first Festival of Falconry. Bird keepers from all over the world attended the event to highlight the popularity and importance of the sport worldwide.

Bedford Square Gardens, England: The Chap & Hendrick's Olympics. A series of tongue-in-cheek competitions for traditional gentlemen who are against the vulgarity of modern culture, this festival includes events such as mixing dry martinis, the three-trousered limbo and a pipe relay.

Dublin, Georgia: The Summer Redneck Games. L-bow, the official mascot of the Summer Redneck Games, poses next to the mud pit with the festival's ceremonial torch. Started in 1996 as a spoof of the summer Olympics held in Atlanta, the Games feature bobbing for pigs feet, hub cap hurling and the Redneck mud pit belly-flop contest.

New Delhi, India: Holi, The Festival of Colors. The word Holi comes from Holika, a scarf in Hindu mythology that prevented one of Lord Vishnu's followers from being burned on a pyre.

Ivrea, Italy: The Battle of Oranges. The origins of this festival are not well understood, particularly because oranges do not grow in the Alps of Italy, where the town is located. One legend has it that the Battle commemorates a popular rebellion of the 13th century, when the local poor deemed the largess of their feudal lord as inadequate, and threw it back in his face.

Boston, USA: Zombie March. For the third straight year, Bostonians dressed as zombies marched from Boston to Cambridge's Harvard Square in what organizers call a non-political, no-agenda good time.
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Bunyol, Spain: Tomatina. Every year, over 30,000 tourists come to Bunyol for this festival. Rules of conduct keep the festivities from becoming a more dangerous brawl.
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Eastern Island, Chile: Tapati Festival. A week-long festival begun in the 1970s in an effort to drum up more tourism, Tapati includes a triathlon in which native participates run around the lake of the Rano Raraku vulcano carrying a large bunch of bananas.

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