NTT to Hold Tenun Sarong Festival on March 2

TEMPO.CO, Kupang - East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) provincial administration will hold a festival of handwoven fabric tenun dubbed Festival Sarung Tenun by involving 10,000 people on Saturday, March 2, 2019. The festival is simultaneously held in all Indonesian regions during the car-free day (CFD) event.

The head of NTT Handicraft Council (Dekranasda), Juli Laiskodat, said that CFD event in the province falls on Saturday, and so NTT will earlier establish the festival.

“The festival will be a public spotlight because NTT will hold it earlier, so the event must be thrilling,” said Juli, who is the wife of NTT Governor Viktor Laiskodat, in a press conference Monday, February 25.

Read also: Culinary Festival to Restore the Glory of Satay Padang

Therefore, Juli demanded all NTT people join the CFD event wearing tenun fabric made from their own respective regions. “Do not use batik or tenun fabric from other regions outside NTT,” she underlined.

Juli explained that the festival aimed at promoting tenun sarong and supporting the empowerment of the community economy, especially wavers, as well as boosting NTT tourism and encouraging millennials to be proud of wearing tenun.

“We will continue to support and promote tenun made in NTT so Unesco will acknowledge it as a cultural heritage,” Juli added, asking the government to set a national sarong day as a must-preserved ancestral heritage.

JOHN SEO