Largest color festival in Erbil bookends Newroz celebrations

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Kurdistan’s largest-ever spring color festival starts at 11:00 a.m. Friday in the in Erbil. 15,000 tickets have already been sold for the two-day festival organized to celebrate the Kurdish new year.

The festival runs from 11 a.m. until 7 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. It includes primarily a color festival, activities for kids and food stalls.

"We held the first [color] festival last year, one that was very successful. So this year we wanted to expand it even further," one organizer told Rudaw, referring to other activities for the festival goers such as music and entertainment.

Tickets cost 10,000 Iraqi dinars. Once purchased, buyers will be given a box which includes a Spring Festival T-shirt, a bag of color powder to throw, a wrist band and a pamphlet of instructions written in Kurdish and English. Children under the age of eight can enter for free.

The theme of the festival is “peace and coexistence,” with organizers expecting people to attend the festival from across the Kurdistan Region, other parts of Iraq, and neighboring countries.

"People as far as Basra and Baghdad have asked for tickets," Hejan Dijwar, an organizer, told Rudaw.

The festival takes place at Glkand Park, across from the University of Kurdistan-Hewler (UKH) campus.

The Spring Festival is co-organized by Babylon FM with the help of Nishtiman Youth Network (NYN).

Another color festival is scheduled to take place in Sulaimani on March 30.