Gov’t announces series of events for Christmas and New Year

The Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC) is organizing various performing arts programs during the Christmas and New Year holidays.

In an announcement, the bureau said it will hold a number of large-scale performances from Dec. 21 to Dec. 31, inviting different artists to Macau.

The IC will attempt to stage a resident Fado show at the Dom Pedro V Theatre, director of the IC, Leong Wai Man, announced yesterday.

Yesterday morning, the bureau organized a press conference to announce its entertainment plans for this Christmas and New Year, where the official made the announcement.

Officially called One Cultural Base, the series of events is aimed at catering to both local residents and visitors during the coming holiday season. Leong revealed that her bureau is trying to introduce Fado music to the 1.5-century-old theater on a regular basis. During its first phase, the bureau aims at staging at least three shows each weekend, incorporating into the show evenings Portuguese and Macanese delicacies.

Fado is dubbed a national treasure of Portugal and was listed in 2011 as World Intangible Heritage.

The official also announced that bundles will be made for local travel agencies to sell to visitors.

Another highlight of this year’s program is an artistic exhibition featuring Tibetan Buddhist artifacts from the Palace Museum and the Tashi Lhunpo Monastery. The Golden Eminence exhibition will see the return of the city’s annual collaboration with the Beijing museum. Tashi Lhunpo Monastery, which has been the traditional seat of successive Panchen Lamas, is one of the four great monasteries of Tibetan Buddhism’s Gelug lineage.

A total of 137 treasures from the collections of both the Palace Museum and Tashi Lhunpo Monastery are on display in this exhibition. These meticulously selected artworks tell the story of the exchanges between the successive Panchen Lamas and the Qing court, showing the unity and integration among diverse ethnic groups along the way.

The exhibition will run from Dec. 16, 2023 to Mar. 17, 2024.

The full list of events – with many co-hosted by casino operators – is available on the website of the bureau.