TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - As many as five foreign participants and over 100 people from different regions in Indonesia will be participating in the International Kite Festival in Surabaya, East Java province on 23 and 24 July, 2016.

The foreign participants are from Malaysia, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Macau, according to the Head of Culture and Tourism Office of Surabaya, Wiwiek Widayati, on Friday.

"The participants will be competing to win prize amounting Rp40 million," she added.

The festival will feature two-dimensional kite contest on the first day, while the next day there will be three-dimensional kite contest, rokkaku challenge, and collective kite flying, Wiwiek said.

The Rokkaku dako is a traditional six-sided Japanese fighter kite made of bamboo spars and washi paper. Washi is the Japanese word for the traditional papers made from long inner fibres of three plants.

Wiwiek said the festival will also welcome Preparatory Committee III United Nation Habitat (PrepCom III UN Habitat) in Surabaya.

The oldest kite in the world is believed originating from Muna Island, South Sulawesi province.

A research by Wolfgong Bick in 1997 showed the people in Muna Islands played kites since four thousand years ago which is locally called "kaghati kalope".

Bick, who is a kite consultant for aerial photography scientific use, found a human hand painting depicting kites in the Sugi Patani cave in Liangkobori village, about eight kilometer from Raha, the capital of Muna island.

ANTARA