Today matya festival is observed in Patan , Nepal.
Matya festival in Lalitpur is one of the festival celebrated in the Newar community with lots of joy and enthusiam. It falls in the month of Shrawan every year.
One of the most fascinating features of this festival is a long parade of the enthusiastic shrine-walkers who go round all the Buddhist shrines scattered in and around the city of Patan. It must be remembered here that Patan alone has more than 1300 Buddhist shrines. The number of shrine-walkers who colorfully form this impressive parade is around three to four thousands.
Men and women both participate in this festival. They carry variety of interesting gifts to make offerings to Lord Buddha. The offerings of rice, grains, flowers, red Powders, sweets, incense and guru patra (a gift cup for guru) are quite common tin the scene. However the offering of oil or butter lamps to Lord Buddha on this auspicious day is a dominant feature. It is interesting to note that the majority of the shrine-walker are the lamp offers to the shrines. Offering lamps in particular to the Buddha on this day is said to signify great enlightenment obtained by overcoming the Maras (temptations).
Visit Nepal and have a good experience of this festival ...