Palembang, Sumsel - The Palembang city administration is inviting ASEAN member countries to participate in a Musi Festival due to take place at Musi River on from October 24 to 27.
The four-day festival would mainly feature a dragon boat contest which is one of the city‘s annual tourism programs this year, chief of the Palembang cultural and tourism office Baharuddin Ali said here on Sunday.
The other highlights of the festival would be a national culinary contest, educational expo, investment expo and motor boat-decorating contest, he said.
He said the motor boat-decorating contest was a routine program to mark Indonesia‘s Independence Day which falls on August 17. But this time it was incorporated with the festival‘s programs as August coincides with the holy month of Ramadhan.
He expressed hope that the festival would be able to attract as many domestic and foreign tourists as possible.
More than 1.3 million domestic and foreign tourists visited the South Sumatra provincial capital in the first half of 2010, he said.
Such festival was last held in 2008 with a number of ASEAN countries including Malaysia taking part.
Musi River is the longest river in Sumatra island. The 750-km long river which flows through Palembang is famous as an important harbor at the era of Sriwijaya kingdom. (*)
Source: http://www.antaranews.com