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Stop Vietnam’s Nem Thuong Pig Slaughter Festival

Stop Vietnam’s Nem Thuong Pig Slaughter Festival

 

Tet celebrations in Vietnam ring in the Lunar New Year early in the New Year (roughly the beginning of February) with weeklong festivities. The entire country is imbued with festive cheer as families reunite and wish for luck in the new year.

Just north of Hanoi in Nem Thuong village, however, the festivities take a dark and murderous turn. It is here, on the sixth day of Tet, that the beat of drums announces the torture that is about to begin. One or two terrified pigs are selected, tied down and paraded through the streets. The villagers gather as men brandishing machetes hack the helpless pigs in half. The blood flows and the crowd cheers. Villagers then dip paper money in the spilled blood, hoping for luck in the new year. This atrocity is known as the Nem Thuong Pig Slaughter Festival.

Despite outcry, the province of Bac Ninh, where Nem Thuong is located, has informed Vietnam’s Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism that the festival will continue in 2016. They have made one minor adjustment, stating that the pigs will not be slaughtered in such a public arena.

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