Ok Om Bok Festival, also called Festival of Worshipping the Moon, is one of the three typical festivals of the Khmer in the circle of one year. In the Khmer’s religious belief, the Moon is the god managing the weathers and crops during the year. This festival takes place on the 15th day of the Cadac month in the Buddhist calendar, i.e. the 15th day of the 10th lunar month, when it changes from the rainy season to the dry season, the growing season to the harvest season. Thus, Ok Om Bok Festival has some similarities with the Thuong Dien festival of the Kinh (a sacrifice dedicated to the God of earth at the beginning of farm work)

    The Ok Om Bok Festival of each village takes place on the yard of a local pagoda,and the whole province’s Ok Om Bok Festival takes place at Ba Om Pond. When the God Moon rises, people give their worship offerings which are farming products they have just harvested such as com dep, banana, sugar-cane etc… in order to express their gratitude and pray the God for support on the coming year with good weathers and green crops. Then the village elders will pick up handfuls of com dep to put into the chil-dren’s mouths with a wish for their strong eating and rapid development (the word Ok om bok literally means eating com dep by picking up it and put into the mouth)

    On the night of Ok Om Bok Festival, a contest of flying-lantern release. A flying lanterns is made with a bamboo frame pasted with paper.A tinder is tied under the frame then fired, which makes the lantern fly high in the air. The flying lantern rises higher and higher as if having taken the hope and belief of the Khmer farmers to the God Moon, who is tucking up the clouds to look down at the earth. At Ba Om Pond, the ritual of the flying-lantern release has become an exciting contest with the participation of tens of pagodas in the province under the encouragement of tens of thousands of festival participants.

    Before it, i.e. on the noon of the 14th day of the 10th lunar month, on the Long Binh River takes place the exciting Ngo Boat Race in the echoing sounds of the Five tones of the traditional musical scale and the resounding encouragement shouts of tens of thousands of audiences. The racing teams from different town and districts on the territory of Tra Vinh province and neaby provinces bring a noisy and stirring atmosphere for the festival. Ngo Boat Race is both a game and a way to express the strength of consolidation,as well as a traditional ritual to see off the God Water to the ocean after the growing season, and a religious ritual of the Khmer to commemorate the Snake God Nagar, who once turned into a lump of wood to help the Buddha cross the river.