Fifteen Buffaloes Are Left From Thirty-Two and the Do Son Final Is on the Nineteenth
Vietnams buffalo fighting festival has split into two rounds for the first time, with the final ten days from now.
The Do Son buffalo fighting festival holds its final on 19 September in Do Son ward, Haiphong. The date is fixed by the lunar calendar, the ninth day of the eighth lunar month, which is why it moves each year.
This is the first year the festival has run in two stages. The qualifying round was on 21 July, the eighth day of the sixth lunar month, with 32 buffaloes in 16 matches in front of more than 10,000 spectators. Fifteen came through to the final.
Organisers describe the two-stage format as a better fit for the festival's origins and for its status as National Intangible Cultural Heritage. The festival has been running in its restored form for 37 years.
Buffaloes are bought and trained for the event across a season, and the matches are between two animals rather than an animal and a person. The festival has drawn criticism on animal welfare grounds and has been suspended before, which is part of why the format has been revisited.
For the region it is one of a handful of traditional animal contests still running at scale, alongside the Chonburi buffalo races in Thailand and bull racing on Madura in Indonesia.