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Ugwueke new yam festival is a very unique one because, on that particular day of the festival, all the villagers are expected to get up at exactly around 7am in unison and walk straight to their farm without doing anything else. Once they get to their various farms, they will start digging up their yams with 100% carefulness. The reason is, they are not allowed to leave a single scratch on the yam because its a taboo and they believe you will offend the goddess of the land
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by doing so. So, they caution their kids against scratching the yams.
After they are done with the harvesting, the will head home carrying their yams with a lot of carefulness because of the same reasons of not falling it on the ground so as not to anger the goddess of the land.
Once they get home, all the villagers will start preparing pounded yam and oruru soup, which they will prepare with roasted chicken.(its a rule that they must all abide to) No one is allowed to prepare something else other than oruru soup with pounded yam and roasted chicken. After they finish eating, they will start going round the whole village visiting their friends and well wishers. Once they are done with the visitation, they will start heading home to get ready for the festival that will be held at the village square in the afternoon.
At the festival, those farmers with the biggest harvest normally bring their produce to showoff to their fellow farmers,
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there will also be lots of presentation from different villages like dancing, singing, etc. All the villagers present at the festival will all be served with Abacha(African salad) and palm wine.
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There will also be masquerade dancing
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where all the villagers will present different kinds of masquerades in different forms.
The festival is going to last till evening, after which, all the villagers will head to their various houses.
