The Rai communities of the eastern hills of Nepal celebrate the Siruwat festival during April and May, on the Nepali first full moon day of the year. Siruwat is celebrated to mark the season of plantation, also called dhule puja, which means worshiping the earth or soil. It is believed that the deities travel to the Himalayas after they are worshiped to avoid the summer. The festival is also called Ubhauli, referring to deities’ movement towards the upper hills/Himalayas. Every Rai household practices this ritual. Deities are offered eggs, alcohol, chicken, water, and freshly harvested rice. There is a belief that if people do not perform this ritual, they will get sick and go mad. Therefore, even people who live far away or are traveling make efforts to return to their village to perform this ritual.

Normally for Dhar-par printing five different fabric colors; white, yellow, red, green and blue are used. These colors represent five elements while cloth is purposefully used for the durability. The prayer flags are either attached to a pole and hoisted on the hills or stitched on a rope and hung on the tree branches, across the cliffs, bridges' railing, and in the sacred places.

The North Wosera bilums are found among the South Abelam people scattered on the low hills of Sepik plains of Maprik, East Sepik Province. The colors and pattern in layers and variations are distinct features in the common Sepik bilum.

On 12 and 13 November 2020, ICHCAP and the ICH NGO Forum virtually held the 2020 ICH NGO Conference entitled “ICH and Resilience in Crisis.” The fifteen participants, including eleven selected presenters from ten countries around the world, discussed various cases and activities of each country applied under the Corona-era, and proposed solidarity for the resilience of ICH for a ‘New Normal.’\n\nSession 1: In the Vortex: COVID-19 Era, Roles of NGOs to Safeguard ICH\n\nSpecial Lecture 1: 'Resilience System Analysis' by Roberto Martinez Yllescas, Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Mexico\n1. 'Uncovering the veil of immaterial cultural heritage towards and autonomous management of well-being as well as cultural and territorial preservation' by Carolina Bermúdez, Fundación Etnollano\n2. 'Holistic Development Model of Community-Based Intangible Cultural Heritage of Yuen Long District in Hong Kong of China' by Kai-kwong Choi, Life Encouraging Fund \n3. 'Indigenous Knowledge System as a vector in combating COVID-19' by Allington Ndlovu, Amagugu International Heritage Centre\n4. 'Enlivening Dyeing Tradition and ICH: The initiative of ARHI in North East of India' by Dibya Jyoti Borah, President, ARHI\n\nSession 2: Homo Ludens vs. Home Ludens: Changed Features COVID-19 Brought\n\n1. 'The Popular Reaction to COVID-19 from the Intangible Cultural Heritage among Member Cities of the ICCN' by Julio Nacher, ICCN Secretariat, Algemesi, Spain\n2. 'Innovation for Arts and Cultural Education Amid a Pandemic' by Jeff M. Poulin, Creative Generation\n3. 'Promoting Heritage Education through Intangible Cultural Heritage in the Kalasha Valleys of Pakistan' by Ghiasuddin Pir & Meeza Ubaid, THAAP\n4. 'Shifting to Online Activities: Digital Divide among the NGOs and ICH Communities in Korea' by Hanhee Hahm CICS\n\nSession 3: Consilience: Prototype vs. Archetype for Educational Source\n\nSpecial Lecture 2: 'Geographical imbalance: the challenge of getting a more balanced representation of accredited non-governmental organizations under the 2003 Convention' by Matti Hakamäki, Finnish Folk Music Institute\n1. 'Crafting a Post Covid-19 World: Building Greater Resilience in the Crafts Sector through Strengthening Ties with its Community’s Cultural System' by Joseph Lo, World Crafts Council International\n2. 'Arts and Influence: Untangling Corporate Engagement in the Cultural Sector' by Nicholas Pozek, Asian Legal Programs, Columbia University\n3. 'ICH in the South-Western Alps: Empowering Communities through Youth Education on Nature and Cultural Practices' by Alessio Re & Giulia Avanza, Santagata Foundation for the Economy of Culture\n\n

This track about the Rali rituals and songs combines speech with singing. This is included as a particularly interesting way to present intangible cultural heritage. Subhadra Devi gives instructions, in Hindi, about why and how the goddess Rali is worshipped each spring. Rali is identified as a form of Parvati, with her husband Senkar a form of Shankar, in the annual spring ritual for unmarried girls to gain a good groom by celebrating the marriage of goddess Rali to Senkar, with her brother Bastu in attendance. Subhadra Devi describes the rituals and the appropriate songs in dialect. She begins with the song for gathering spring flowers and making garlands for Rali each morning. Then, she moves on to the song about assembling objects for rituals. She goes on to describe how observant girls fast over four Mondays and go from household to household singing in order to gather donations for their Rali ritual. She then offers an example of this sort of song, in which the theme of male migrant labor common in the hills spills into mythological domains here, with Rali’s brother Bastu off to Delhi, while Senkar has gone to work in Chamba, each offering to send her gifts. Subhadra Devi ends by singing an example of the sort of devotional song or bhajan sung by grown women at the auspicious ending of the Rali ritual, when the goddess is carried to a pool to be submerged. This song addresses the mulberry tree from whose wood a flute for Krishna might be made. It describes the unfinished fates of those who haven’t ever given alms, fasted on ritual days, constructed raised stands for wayfarers to rest under shady trees, or given daughters in marriage. Recorded and collected by Kirin Narayan

Kaura songs are traditional folk songs sung by people from the Magar community of the mid-western and western hills. They are sung during Dashain, Tihar, and Chandi Purnima. The tempo of the song is slow at the beginning and gradually moves up to medium or fast beat. Kaura songs are sung in a question-answer form.

CD6_WOMEN’S VOICES FROM THE MOUNTAINS\n\nThe women performing here are not professional musicians. These songs are part of the everyday life of women. Women’s songs are often work songs sung while grinding, threshing, and pounding, as a way to while away the tedium of long laborious tasks and provide a rhythm as well as companionship. Women play a key role in rituals, singing narratives and ballads as well as life cycle songs for events such as birth, marriage, and death. Wedding songs form a large part of the repertoire of women in India. This important part of the intangible cultural heritage of India is disappearing with urbanization and migration to cities, and with mechanization that takes away the need for grinding and pounding. Moreover, recorded music and television are taking the place of song. Thus, the recording and documentation of these traditions become more important. Namely, recordings of the voices of the woman in the home and in the fields, who carry out the rituals for their families and the gods who protect them, hold immense value. This is a compilation of women’s songs from the foothills of the Himalayas, Kangra in Himachal Pradesh (the “land of the snows”), and from high up in the Garhwal Himalayas in Uttarakhand (the “northern land”). Though not connected, there are similarities in the themes between the ghasyari songs and khuder of Garhwal and the pakaharu of Kangra. Women sing about their hardships, such as their daily struggles with marriage, absent husbands, and about the friendship among women. These songs do not have any instrumental accompaniment. The songs are from the research conducted by two wo men researchers: Kirin Narayan and Ragini Deshpande. The songs from Kangra are those recorded and collected by Kirin Narayan, who has worked in Kangra, studying women’s songs and stories for many years. The selection presented here is from 1990 to 1991. Ragini Deshpande recorded and collected women’s songs in Chamoli, Garhwal, from 1981 to 1989. As Sangita Devi says quoted by Kiri Narayan, “Everyone can sing, but only when you know pain can you understand the song.”

CD8_FOLK SONGS OF THE INDIGENOUS CASTES\n\nThe indigenous castes of Nepal have a variety of cultural events to mark different life happenings, from birth to death, which are all accompanied by music. These events depend on topography, and may vary even within a caste. Generally, people express their emotions through music in occasions such as Dashain , MagheSakranti , Purnima , or seasonal events, such as rice transplanting, rice harvesting, or millet plucking. In such festivals, each of the indigenous castes exhibits its way of life and culture through traditional attires, instruments, songs, and dances.

ICH Courier is the quarterly magazine on ICH in the Asia-Pacific region issued by ICHCAP since 2009. Every issue has its own theme under the title of the Windows to ICH, and the theme of the Vol 6 is 'ICH AND MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS'.

This book explores creative and historical traditional food of the world through the articles provided by sixteen authors from different countries. Food is a critical element in human life and is intimately linked to the history and identity of individuals and communities. Traditional food and food ways of a community, region, or an ethnic group have become unique practices through close interactions reflecting the diverse features of the community, including the natural environment, society, politics, economy, and culture. Traditional food and food ways are then firmly embedded in the community while they are transmitted, adapted, and recreated across generations. As such, traditional food is an indispensable element in communal life and is the root of life. This book presents information on ICH reflected in traditional food and allows readers to explore the intangible value of traditional food through historical backgrounds and stories concerning the food.