This year festival will formally start on February 16 with incense offering ritual and procession from Le Huu Trac Temple locating in Huong Son district’s Son Quang commune. Then, main activities of the festival will take place at the site of Le Huu Trac tomb located in the district’s Son Trung commune where a grand prayers ceremony for people’s good health and the country’s peace will be held on Feb. 18.

Before that, a series of sport activities will also be held in early February, including a running – climbing, a boat race in Ngan Pho River and a poetry day, etc.

Le Huu Trac, also known great physician Hai Thuong Lan Ong (1720-1791), was born in in Yen My district, northern Hung Yen province and spent most of his life in Huong Son district, Ha Tinh province.

One of his great contributions to Vietnamese traditional medicine was the summarisation of the essence of human medicine and Vietnamese traditional medicine into voluminous texts, such as ‘Hai Thuong Y Tong Tam Linh’ (The comprehension of Hai Thuong on medicine), which is considered the encyclopedia of Vietnamese Traditional Medicine with thousands of recipes and hundreds of remedies.

He was also a shining example of medical ethics. Nine articles in his ‘Y Huan Cach Ngon’ (Instructions on medical ethics) have been adopted as the ethical guideline and principles for medicine practice for Vietnamese physicians.

Each year on the first full moon in the first lunar month - the day of his death, locals and medical staff across the country flock to Huong Son for Hai Thuong Lan Ong Festival. The event has become an annual tradition in the spiritual and cultural life of local people in tribute to the enormous contribution by the famous physician to Vietnamese medicine.

To continue preserving and promoting the values of the festival, on October 13, 2015, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism recognised the festival as a national intangible cultural heritage.

PTT