This international festival will run from March 27th to 19th in Vũng Tàu, just two-hour drive from Saigon.
When we were young and living in the villages, kids did not have the luxury games to play as PC games, iPod, iPhone neither PS3. Kids therefore went outside and created their war games made from paper, bamboos or residual steel sheets including kites. Making kites with different colors and motives was quite possible but made them fly was considered as a success…
Kites were used approximately 2,800 years ago in China, where materials ideal for kite building were readily available: silk fabric for sail material; fine, high-tensile-strength silk for flying line; and resilient bamboo for a strong, lightweight framework. Alternatively, the kite authors Clive Hart and Tal Streeter hold that leaf kites existed far before that time in what is now Indonesia, based on their interpretation of cave paintings on Muna Island off Sulawesi. The kite was said to be the invention of the famous 5th century BC according to Chinese philosophers Mozi and Lu Ban. By at least 549 AD paper kites were being flown, as it was recorded in that year a paper kite was used as a message for a rescue mission. While people have flown kites for more than 2000 years, it is hard to trace this activity’s origins. Made of paper, fabric and wood, no ancient kites remain. Researchers must depend on legends, illustrations and documents for evidence of kites’history. According to legends, kites were being flown to China 2800 years ago. Documents describing kite flying date back to 200 BC when a Han dynasty general used a kite to estimate the distance to an enemy fortress, then dug a tunnel and breached the fortress’ walls. Another Han general is said to have flown hundreds of simple bamboo kites above an enemy’s camp to create a flapping sound that sent the soldiers into panic as they mistook the kites for evil spirits.
Other Chinese legends describe kites being used to carry fireworks that scared the enemy, while old Chinese and Japanese prints depict giant kites carrying spies and snipers aloft. A Japanese legend tells how a thief named Kakinoki Kinsuke used a kite in a attempt to steal a golden dolphin statue from the roof of Nagoya Castle, only to be caught and boiled alive.
Ancient and medieval Chinese sources list other uses of kites for measuring distances, testing the wind, lifting men, signaling, and communication for military operations. The earliest known Chinese kites were flat (not bowed) and often rectangular. Later, tailless kites incorporated a stabilizing bowline. Kites were decorated with mythological motifs and legendary figures; some were fitted with strings and whistles to make musical sounds while flying.
Stories of kites were brought to Europe by Marco Polo towards the end of the 13th century, and kites were brought back by sailors from Japan and Malaysia in the 16th and 17th centuries. Although they were initially regarded as mere curiosities, but by the 18th and 19th centuries kites were being used as vehicles for scientific research.
In 1750, Benjamin Franklin published a proposal for an experiment to prove that lightning is electricity by flying a kite in a storm that appeared capable of becoming a lightning storm. It is not known whether Franklin ever performed his experiment, but on May 10, 1752, Thomas-François Dalibard of France conducted a similar experiment (using a 40-foot (12 m) iron rod instead of a kite) and extracted electrical sparks from a cloud.
The period from 1860 to about 1910 became the "golden age of kiting". Kites started to be used for scientific purposes, especially in meteorology, aeronautics, wireless communications and photography; reliable manned kites were developed as well as power kites. Invention of powered airplane diminished interest in kites. World War II saw a limited use of kites for military purposes (see Focke Achgelis Fa 330 for example). Since then they are used mainly for recreation due to a vast improvement in technology. Kite flying is popular in many Asian countries, where it often takes the form of 'kite fighting', in which participants try to snag each other's kites or cut other kites down. Fighter kites are usually small, flat, flattened diamond-shaped kites made of paper and bamboo. Tails are not used on fighter kites so that agility and maneuverability are not compromised.
In Afghanistan, kite flying is a popular game, and is known in Dari as Gudiparan Bazi. Some kite fighters pass their strings through a mixture of ground glass powder and glue. The resulting strings are very abrasive and can sever the competitor's strings more easily. The abrasive strings can also injure people. During the Taliban rule in Afghanistan, kite flying was banned, among various other recreations.
In Pakistan, kite flying is often known as Gudi-Bazi or Patang-bazi. Although kite flying is a popular ritual for the celebration of spring festival known as Jashn-e-Baharaan (lit. Spring Festival) or Basant, kites are flown throughout the year. Kite fighting is a very popular all around Pakistan, but centered in urban centers across the country especially Lahore. The kite fights are at their maximum during the spring celebrations and the fighters enjoy competing with rivals in which one have to cut-loose the string of the kite of other, this is popularly called as "Paecha". During the spring festival, kite flying competitions are held across the country and the skies are colored with kites. As people cut-loose an opponent kites, shouts of 'wo kata' ring through the air. Reclaiming the kites after they have been cut-loose by running after them, is a popular ritual especially among the youth (similar to scenes depicted in the Kite Runner which is based in neighboring Afghanistan). Kites and strings are a big business in the country and many types of strings are used: glass-coated strings, metal strings and tandi. However, kite flying was recently banned in Punjab due to recent motorcyclist deaths caused by glass-coated or metal kite-strings. Kup, Patang, Guda, and Nakhlaoo are some of the kites used. They vary in balance, weight and speed through the air.
In many Asian countries kites have gained spiritual significance. The Polynesian god Rongo is both the patron saint of the arts and kite flying. New Zealand’s Maori people associated kites with birds, which were thought to carry message to the gods. As well as being practiced divination and at funerals, kite flying was considered a sacred ritual, often accompanied by a turu manu chant like this one:
My bird, by power of charm ascending,
In the glance of an eye, like the sparrow hawk,
By this charm shall my bird arise,
Beyond bestride the heavens.
Like the stars Atutahi and Rehua,
And there spread out the wings,
To the very clouds. Truly so.
In Korea, parents would release a kite after the birth of a male baby so that the kite could carry away any bad luck left over from the infant’s past lives. Thai farmers would fly kites at the start of the monsoon to beseech the gods to make the winds blow and prevent their fields from flooding. Also in Thailand during the winter months imperial monks would fly kites devoted to the king and queen continuously so as to protect the monarchs from harm.
It is believed that Buddhist monks brought kites to Japan from China between the 6th and the 8 centuries. The Japanese took kiting to new heights, creating kites shaped like birds, fish and dragons. For the next ten centuries the Japanese associated kites with religious worship. Kites were flown to pray for good harvests, to prevent illness and bad luck, and to congratulate new parents. Even today it’s customary for Japanese people to fly windsocks shaped like carps – a symbol of strength and resilience – on the Children’s day, which falls on May 5th.
Throughout Asia kites are flown at important festivals and celebrations. In northern India, the spring festival of Makr Sankranti, which falls on January 15th, is devoted to kite fighting. Participating fly small, highly maneuverable kites of Vadodara, Surat and Ahmedabad are excellent places to experience the mid-January kite flying festival, as residents fly kites from dawn to dusk, accompanied by music.
The Vietnamese, meanwhile have created kites that sound as interesting as they look. Rather than have tails, these kites called diều sáo, sport flutes of different sizes and materials that produce noises like birds, gongs, musical instruments or car horns. Villages in the central and northern Vietnam regularly hold contests to create the prettiest and most musical diều sáo. Noise-making kites are found in other Asian countries too. In Bali large bows are attached to kites to create deep throbbing sound, while some Malaysian kites feature slit gourd that whistle.
Today Chinese city of Weifang promotes itself as “Kite Town:. Since 1984 the Weifang International Kite Festival has been held annually from April 20th to 25th, drawing hundreds of kite-flying teams from around the world and tens of thousands of spectators. Weifang is also home to the world’s largest kite museum which covers an amazing 8100 square meters.
Close to home, on March 27th 2010 a three-day International Kite Festival will be held in the beach of Vũng Tàu, just two hour drive from Saigòn. Kite-flying teams from seven countries are signed up to attend and visitors can look forward to colorful contests, displays and exhibits about the history of kiting.
I have an ambition that someday I will try to come back to my homeland to find the beautiful kite of my childhood…
