Cap Go Meh Festival

Singkawang is well-known as the city of thousand temples. This city has many temple that used by Chinese people to pray. Singkawang city is also known as the duplicate of Hongkong in China or Indonesian China – town. This is because there are many Chinese people live there as well as preserving their culture through many Chinese celebrations.

            One of the celebrations is called Cap Go Meh. This is a kind of celebration or ceremonial that conduct in every fifteen days after Chinese New Year celebration that known as Imlek. The ceremonial also meaning that the Imlek celebration is over. In this celebration there are many attraction performs in the up-town  from Barongsai or the dragon show, until Tatung performance, the person who has great and mystical power that resistant to sword and nails.

            Long time ago before Cap Go Meh become annual ceremony in Singkawang, the ceremonial has banned by the government. In 1965 when Soeharto era, the government had stopped the celebration. It was something illegal to conduct on that time because of the 30 S/PKI tragedies. It was an effort to topple down the government and exchange with a communism ideology. Since that time, all of the Chinese activity and celebrations were forbidden from Imlek, Barongsai until Cap Go Meh. 

            But since the changing of the government ideology from Soeharto dictatorship to democracy era, finally the border and prohibition to Chinese celebration is decreasing. The moment of eliminating the discrimination to the Chinese finally over when President Abdurrahman Wahid era. Since then Chinese people are free to celebrate their celebration.

            After Chinese people are allowed to conduct their culture back, they now become one of the important and valuable assets for our country. In this Cap Go Meh ceremonial now already acculturated with other local culture from Malay, Dayaknese and Chinese itself. Even now there is a batik name Tidayu that stand for Tiong Hoa, Dayak and Melayu Batik. They perform and preserve their culture side by side in the name of unity in diversity of Indonesia.