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Promoting Safety at the Naadam Festival
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Two hundred volunteers with the Global Peace Festival-Mongolia promoted public safety and a clean environment July 11 and 12, 2008, in the capital, Ulaanbaatar, during the Naadam Festival, Mongolia’s Independence Day and main holiday celebration.
Young people helped pedestrians cross streets and directed them to public transportation. Volunteers held up stop signs at intersections so cars would stop and people could walk across the street safely. A large number of buses serve Ulaanbaatar’s population of a million people. With many buses parked around the stadium, it was often difficult to find the right bus to take them home, and volunteers helped people find the bus they needed. They also held up posters asking people to use seat belts, drive safely, and not discard their trash in public places.
Other volunteers cleaned up the whole Central Stadium, including the seats, so people could enjoy the national festival in comfort. Some people in the crowd who were about to toss their trash on the ground saw the volunteers going around with trash bags and apologized, sometimes helping to pick up more trash. The stadium, which is used for many types of events, has seats for 20,000 people.
To highlight the concept that service to the public is an honorable and uplifting activity, the event was called a service "party." Its theme was: “Let’s joyfully change the city.” This was the fourth in a series of service parties in the capital and other cities, including Darkhan and Erdenet, and the province of Uvurkhanga.
Students traditionally spend the summer with their families, but serving the public together with other youth made them feel that they were truly celebrating the national festival. Those who participated in the project gained a new sense of value and expressed a desire to be part of the Global Peace Festival main activities September 6-9.
Such public service was new in Mongolia, and the public expressed appreciation for the services provided by the volunteers. The Global Peace Festival coordinated plans with the City Beautification Department, the Public Transportation Authority, the Metropolitan Traffic Police, and the Central Naadam Stadium.
The annual Naadam celebrations begin with an elaborate ceremony featuring dancers, athletes, horsemen, and musicians. Wrestling, horse racing, and archery contests are the main features of the festival, which is believed to have taken place for many centuries in one fashion or another. The modern festival commemorates the 1921 revolution when Mongolia declared itself a free country.