Mangalore, 13 April 2011: Team Mangalore, hobby group of kite flyers, after their successful exhibition of their talent in Europe and America, has once again made India proud by their outstanding performance in the recently concluded Uiseong International Kite Festival held at Uiseong, South Korea. Team Mangalore has gained appreciation from spectators and organizers of the festival as well. The world class teams consisting of famous kite flyers from 24 countries of the world participated in this mega event. Team Mangalore participated in this event as representatives of India on their invitation and presented Indian Culture through kites to the people of Korea. Team exhibited their famous kite collection depicting Indian Dance forms through their kites such as “Bharathnatyam”, “Yakshagana”, “Kathakalli”, “Bhoota Kola” and “Pushpaka Vimana”. These kites attracted the crowd and got appreciation from all visitors there.
With a view to exchange culture amongst the countries Mr.Kim Bak Que , Governor of Uiseong city of South Korea had organized this festival under theme “ GLOBAL CULTURE PARTNER”. Mr. Sarvesh Rao , Mr.Prashant Upadhyaya (MRPL), Mr.Dinesh Holla and Mr. Nitin Shetty of Team Mangalore participated in this event. In this event held from 31st March to 2nd April 2011 in addition to kite flying various other cultural activities were also organized to support the belief of people of Korea with respect to agricultural prosperity and peace to all.
The festival was inaugurated with the Traditional Korean Dance with traditional Korean costumes by 20 Korean couples. The stage was designed like a kite which had throne where Dragon’s Head and a Kite were kept. The traditional dancers offered prayers in the form of dance, chanting etc. followed by grand parade of all the participants in their traditional costume. The four members of team with traditional white Dhoti flying Indian Flag participated in the Grand parade. The parade had the feel of Kite Olympics. In the festival ground, on the inaugural Day a tower of dry leaves of around 50Feet height was built and people were sticking a long paper written in Korean Language around the tower. During valedictory parade Mr.Kin Bak Que, the governer of Uiseong and other members burnt this tower, the flames of which reached the sky. This burning of tower was done with a belief that all the bad things to become ashes and good thinking and dreams to reach sky high with flying kites.
The festival had various cultural activities in which Mr.Prashant Upadhyaya of Team Mangalore presented Yakshagana Dance to the people of South Korea which was well appreciated by the perople and organizers. He presented Yakshagana in Korean Language and later explained the theme of the festival and conveyed the wishes to the festival with this Dance form. With this dance form presentation, the Team Mangalore had exchanged the south Indian Dance form to Korea. The team also conducted workshop for the children for making Indian Fighter Kites and with this workshop, the team was appreciated by children too. Mr. Kitayee Ri , the main organizer of the festival was very much attracted with the kites of team Mangalore, yakshagana performance of Mr.Prashant , personal traits of Mr.Sarvesh and Nitin Shetty, line art sketches of Mr.Dinesh Holla and overall attitude of team and was emotionally attached to the team. Thus the team emerged as a friendly team of Asian continent.