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Pulling Wooden Drum Festival: The "Gerui" month of the Wa calendar, which is equivalent to December of the solar calendar, is the time for pulling the wooden drum. Unlike the popular leather drums, a wooden drum is a drum made of a whole piece of tree-trunk, its surface not enveloped with any leathers. On the eve of the festival, the headman and the "moba" (priest) of the village lead several male villagers to a tall tree that they have already chosen beforehand. Under the tree, they first make offerings and chant incantations to expel evils spirits. Then the "moba" brandishes an ax, making a few cuts on the trunk of the tree. Other villagers then chop it down. After that, they put three stones on the tree stump as a token payment to the tree ghost for buying the tree. Then they cut the trunk into the size suitable for the drum they need.

Next morning, all the villagers put on their best costumes and go to the mountain to join in pulling the log (semi-finished wooden drum) down to the village. The "moba" guides the procession with twigs held in his right hand, leading some male villagers to pull the log and sing the song "pulling the wooden drum". Other villagers either shout loudly to boost their morale or scatter rice and splash wine on the ground as the log is pulled along. The log is left at the entrance to the village for two or three days. After the sacrificial rite with cocks as offerings, the log is pulled from the village gate to the place beside the wooden drum house where the carpenters will fashion it into a drum. In pulling the wooden drum, both men and women participate, singing and dancing. Some young people often take this opportunity to find their future husbands or wives. The whole program lasts for many hours. After the drum is made and tested, people put it into the wooden drum house, where they dance heartily again to the drum beats.

Sowing Seeds Festival: Sowing Seeds Festival is held in the "Qiai" month of the Wa calendar, that is, March of the solar calendar. In this festival, the Wa people gather to sacrifice an ox. The event is usually hosted by the owner of the ox. After the owner butchers the ox by thrusting an iron sword into its heart, its flesh is divided evenly into many parts, which are used by the villagers as offerings to worship their ancestors. The bones of the ox, symbolizing wealth, belong to its owner. After worshipping their ancestors and having lunch, the Wa people begin to sow rice seeds.

Fresh Rice Festival: Fresh Rice Festival is the favorite festival of the Wa people and usually lasts three days. In the middle of the eighth month of the lunar calendar when paddies are just ripe, all the Wa families go to the paddy fields to pick some fresh paddies at the time announced by the village headman. When returning home, they put some paddies in the prepared barn or bamboo basket, and pound the rest to be husked rice grains, which are soon cooked. After that, they place 7 bowls of rice with meat and 7 bowls of wine as offerings on the table, inviting the spirits of their ancestors and the gods in charge of the heaven, earth, mountains, and grains to enjoy their harvests. Then they burn 7 pieces of incense. At the end of the rite, all the family members eat the 7 bowls of rice. In the evening, Most of the people gather to enjoy the festival, singing and dancing until dawn. On the second day, all the young people go out to repair the old roads and bridges or build new ones, making ready for carrying bags of fresh paddies into the village. On the third day, the Wa people, continue to enjoy the festival with more singing and dancing. The young men and women often take this opportunity to seek out a mate.

"Bengnanni" Festival: "Bengnanni" Festival, which is the Wa festival for bidding farewell to the past and welcoming new arrivals, is held on the last day in the last month of the Wa calendar. Before dawn, all the young and middle-aged men gather in the house of the village headman, with a pig and a cock killed as sacrificial offerings. Each family, holding a basin of glutinous rice and a piece of baba (rice cake) on a bamboo table, pays a New Year call to the headman and worship ghosts, gods and their ancestors. After that, all the Wa people give babas to one another, greeting with words of blessings. At dawn, after presenting offerings to their sacred tree, the Wa people go hunting and fishing, praying for good luck in the new year.

TOPCulture and Art
Literature: The Wa Ethnic Minority boasts rich and colorful folklore, vivid myths, touching poems and legends. Famous myths include "Sigang Li", "ancestors of the human being", "the big snake is vomiting" and "the origin of all things", the most popular of which is "Sigang Li". The Wa people have created many oral stories to praise goodness and justice and to attack perfidiousness and hypocrisy. "The old man and the crocodile" is such a typical story.

Singing and dancing are very important to the Wa people. At festivals, the Wa people, wearing their best costumes, sing and dance day and night for several days. There are many forms of Wa folk dances including the drum dance, pole dance, sword dance, plume dance, lusheng dance, hand towel dance, string instrument dance, gong dance, and bamboo flute dance. The subdivisions of drum dance are wooden drum dance, tom-tom dance, elephant-foot drum dance, bronze drum dance, and bamboo drum dance. Of these, wooden drum dance best represents the characteristics of the Wa Ethnic Minority.

The Wa people regard the wooden drum as a divine tool that has exceptional power and is the symbol of existence and prosperity. They believe in many gods, of whom, Muyiji is a powerful god that creates all things in the world and has the right to decide their life and death. Legend has it that, long ago, at the beginning of history, a disastrous flood devoured almost all the lives on land. It was Muyiji that saved the Wa people with a wooden trough, which later enabled them to survive and develop. Therefore, in most of the traditional sacrificial rites, the Wa people pay a high tribute to the wooden drum and worship Muyiji, praying for his blessings by singing and dancing.

Wooden drum dance is a traditional dance that is performed to worship Muyiji in the "Gerui" month of the Wa calendar (the 12th month of the lunar calendar). It consists of four main parts: "pulling wooden drum", "dancing in the house of wooden drum", "beating wooden drum", and "offering sacrifices to Muyiji", faithfully reproducing the solemn scenes of the ancient Wa people's unceasing and united struggle against nature and reflecting their yearning for a happy life.

The most common wooden drum dance is "beating wooden drum". The Wa people use wood drums and cymbals as major instruments, which are blended with songs and chanting, to create the main melody with strong and harmonious rhythm full of encouragement and impulsion. Men wear red ribbons on their heads and wide pants; women, with white ribbons on their heads, wear bracelets and skirts, and their long hair swings loose and wild. The dance is grand: At dusk, a long haired female dancer stands on the wooden drum, raising hands to the sky. Two men stand at each end of the drum with drum sticks in hand; other actors are around the drum, dancing slowly to the singers' call, the drum and cymbals. It's a mixture of slow and fast beat, anger and sadness, anxiety and happiness. As the highlight comes, the dancing steps become orderly and powerful, straightforward and uninhibited, grand and magnificent, which, seeming to shake the sky and the land, fully describes the Wa people's vigorous vitality and their spirit of fighting against nature.

The content and the performing techniques of today's wooden drum dance have reached a higher level. It has adopted some movements of the Wa women such as "swinging hair", which thus adds to the charm of Wa's art. Wooden drum dance is a shining pearl in the culture of wood drum.

Sculpture and Painting The sculptures and paintings of the Wa people bear strong minority characteristics and high artistic levels. Ancient cliff paintings of the Wa people have been discovered in Yunnan Province in recent years. The cliff paintings in Cangyuan County, which describe the hunting, dancing and working scenes of the ancient Wa people with simple, straightforward and uninhibited patterns, are rare and valuable artistic treasures useful to the study of the history of the Wa Ethnic Minority.