River festival livens up Leicestershire

River Soar is the most important river in Leicestershire. And every year in June, a river festival is held on its banks in Leicester. It has always been growing both in size and number. Held over the weekend, it had live music, children’s play activities, food stalls, boat rides, Bollywood dancing and lot more fun activities for all. It was organised by Leicester city council with the main sponsor being a local housing provider.
The best thing this time was the sunny weather making everyone come out and enjoy the two days. On the first day, the dragon boat challenge was very exciting and people gathered on the banks of the Soar to cheer. The next most popular activity was the canoe handling on the river. Most of the crowd were around to the beer tent in the adjoining park which also had live acoustic music. There were lots of activities for kids from face painting, mehndi, magic shows and bouncy slides. There were food stalls also serving Thai, British, Chinese, Indian and Colombian food. The long queues outside the Indian food stall did prove again the popularity of Indian cuisine here. Also there were local craftsmen with their art on display and the fare included wood carvings, statues, scarves, hats, earrings, cardigans, jams, pickles and cakes. Most people had a good time shopping around and also bargaining!! This brought back memories of good old street shopping in Kolkata. Litter was cleaned up at the end of the festival.
Indeed, the river festival is nothing grand and neither is it done in large scale but it definitely showcases the river and gives the local businesses a good opportunity to sell to local residents and tourists coming to the festival. River festivals are quite common in different countries unlike in India. Though India has book fairs, handicrafts melas, fairs surrounding festivals, having river festivals surrounding the numerous natural waterways in our country could liven up the scene in many ways by generating business and funds for keeping rivers pollution-free. It would be great to see river festivals in cities like Kolkata, Patna, Varanasi, Allahabad and Haridwar.