A PLACE TO CELEBRATE

HAPPY
GAWAI
2013

Gawai Dayak
is a festival celebrated in Sarawak  and West Kalimantan  e.g. on 31 May and 1 June every year. It is both a religious and social occasion. The word Gawai means a ritual or festival whereas Dayak is a collective name for the native ethnic groups of Sarawak (and neighboring Indonesian Kalimantan ): the Iban, also known as Sea Dayak and the Bidayuh people, also known as Land Dayak    and the Orang Ulu (inclusive of Kayans, Kenyahs, etc.). Thus, Gawai Dayak literally means “Dayak Festival”. Dayak would visit their friends and relatives on this day. Such visit is more commonly known as “ngabang” in the Iban language . Those too far away to visit would receive greeting cards. If there is a formal invitation to visit, the ngalu pengabang/temuai (welcoming guests/visitors) activity will be performed by the inviting longhouse.

It started back in 1957 in a radio forum held by Tan Kingsley and Owen Liang, a radio programme organiser. This generated a lot of interest among the Dayak community.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gawai_Dayak

This entry was posted on June 2, 2013 at 10.05 and is filed under HOME. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.