Oyster festival opens in Shajing

The 19th Shajing Golden Oyster Festival opened Friday in Bao’an District. The festival, which will run until Jan.10 next year, offers a total of 23 activities to let the public enjoy the most representative traditional folk and cultural events in Shenzhen and even Guangdong Province, according to Shenzhen Evening News.

Clowns at a fair of the 2nd Oyster Life Festival, a parallel activity of the 19th Shajing Golden Oyster Festival. Shenzhen Evening News

After 18 years’ development, the festival has become one of the most important cultural events for Shenzhen residents. Shajing oyster is the city’s specialty, and the festival aims to build Shajing into a cultural and folk tourism destination featuring historical culture, entertainment, innovation and businesses.

This year, the festival also organized an exhibition to display Shajing’s intangible cultural heritage to allow visitors to explore the beauty of its ancient town.

Villagers take part in an oyster-opening contest in Shajing, Bao’an District on Friday.

To encourage more visits, the event was also held via livestreaming. Internet influencers were invited to promote traditional food and various types of oyster-related products. A livestreaming studio was placed on the scene to promote online sales of oyster-related food products.

In addition, oyster farmers were seen showcasing their oyster cooking skills to present how delicious the oysters are.

For over 1,000 years, the people of Shajing have been raising oysters and in 2007, oyster breeding in Shajing, along with other local oyster-related customs, was put into Shenzhen’s intangible cultural heritage list.

Dancers perform traditional Chinese dancing at the opening ceremony of the 19th Shajing Golden Oyster Festival.

Shajing has also seen a big boom in developing other cultural causes. Its Child Cantonese Opera won many national and provincial awards and Shajing Ancient Fair revitalization project won a UNESCO award in 2021.