Dragon Boat Festival or Duanwu Festival is celebrated by almost all South East Asian countries. It is basically a race amongst the Dragon Boats, which is celebrated in the month of December in Indonesia, and fifth day of the fifth month in other countries based on Chinese lunar calendar. This is the major Indonesian international sporting event, which draws world-wide participation. Duanwu Festival is basically a Chinese culture, which has acquired prominent place in Indonesia due to huge Chinese population.

Dragon Boat Festival attracts large number of viewers from all parts of world. It is a big event which is accompanied by local entertainment, food stalls and many other local activities. This festival is the best place to experience the delicious local Indonesian food in the stalls while watching the boats competing with each other.

Festival organizers invite domestic and international teams from places such as United States, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, China and other countries. This exciting fun filled boat race starts after a huge gong sound. Viewers cheer-up their team with loud noise throughout the race.

Dragon boats are long and narrow with colorful dragon head at the front and a tail at the rear of the boat. They are well decorated and painted in dazzling colors. The boat looks similar to a dragon when the race starts because of its perfect color, shape and structure. It resembles as if actual dragons are racing in water with one another. Each boat consists of 22 people, one steerer, one drummer and 20 paddlers. In most cases, this huge colorful boat is rowed by only18 paddlers. The drummer sits in the front and beats the drum on the movement of the paddlers in harmony. The drumming rhythm maintains coordination between paddlers and builds inter-team bonding.

This event is held annually and it is much awaited by the local and international tourists, to watch the marvelous colorful racing boats. It is absolutely amazing to view and experience.