Beratan Lake: Festival of cleaning (?) the water

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We stayed in a resort right on the shore of Beratan lake, and in the morning I was woken up by a sound of drums. A crowd of people gathered by the shore, at the place with an ancient-looking stone god statue.

They sang, played the drums, rang the bells, worshiped the gods of the lake, and many were simply chattering and hanging around. Women were carrying gifts to the gods.

A colorful procession with gifts and umbrellas came almost right into the water to place the gifts.

I was told that it was the festival of cleaning the water of the lake.

What surprised me, after the ceremony was over and all the people were gone, is how much litter they left on the shore O_O

Of course they cleaned it up afterwards, but part of the rubbish had already been blown by wind into the water and they didn’t bother to take it out. So was it a bad joke to call this festival - cleaning the water?

This festival lasted for a few days and each time the crowd of people was bigger and so was the amount of litter left in the lake.

We are living in 21 century. Isn't it high time to reconsider our attitude to nature and not to let traditions be harmful to it?

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Comments

[mukt]

We are living in 21 century. == We are. Not them, unfortunately