Chak-ka-yer or tug-of-war is one of the oldest traditional team games of Thailand. It is believed that chak-ka-yer derived from imitating the work of humans pulling a trolley with a heavy load, the behaviors of bulls, buffaloes, or elephants in pulling heavy things, and a Buddhist ceremony called Chak-Phra, in which a Buddha image is placed on a beautifully decorated cart and pulled in a procession so that people pay respect to the Buddha image as it rolled by.

Lum, also called medicinal bathing, is an important part of Sowa Rigpa (Tibetan Medicine) with a long history. In Tibetan, “Lum” indicates the traditional knowledge and practices of bathing in natural hot springs, herbal water, or steam to adjust the balance of mind and body, to ensure health and treat illnesses. Lum medicinal bathing is popular among Tibetan people because of its wide indication, safety, and effectiveness.

The beautiful body-sway of Malaysian traditional dance is often showcased outside the country as an effort by Tourism Malaysia to introduce local arts to the world. Aside from the mainstream traditional dance, Malaysian aborigines are also known for their unique traditional dance art. Unfortunately, these forms are not commonly known nor are they publicized as much as modern dance art.

Storytelling is an important aspect of the human experience. Through stories, we learn, we share, we feel, we express, and we remember. And in the Pacific, stories serve as the thread that connects us with our places. Our stories hold lessons of the strength, struggles, and solidarity that shape the identity all Pacific Islanders, as well as the accumulated knowledge, world views, and ways of knowing developed through firsthand engagement with our environment. However, while critical to survival in our places, our stories and the knowledge held in them are not always valued in school. This leaves a gap in education that alienates communities from classrooms and young learners from the collective wisdom that would guide them into a thriving future.

Vietnam is a country with a coastline stretching over 3,260 km. It is perhaps no surprise, then, that the country has seen versatile maritime cultures flourish. Fisheries, marine product processing, fish sauce production, shipbuilding (including fishing net manufacturing), and maritime freight services, among others, are major sources of employment in Vietnam, while the abundance of fishing grounds in the seas all around the country has resulted in fishing villages as well as coastal cities and provinces springing up in their vicinity.

On the east bank of the Mekong River about fifteen kilometers from Phnom Penh is Wat Svay Andet, a Buddhist monastic community mainly supported by two villages, Ta Skor and Peam Ek of Lvea-em District, Kandal Province. Wat Svay Andet is home to lkhon khol, a kind of theatre with recitation in which actors are all males, wear lacquer masks, and perform only scenes from Reamker, a Cambodian version of the Sanskrit Ramayana epic. This dance drama is accompanied by pinpeat, a traditional orchestra of percussion instruments. Although the dance is performed by villagers, the costumes and ornaments are as magnificent as those of classical court dance.

Chinese martial arts present a unique combination of bare-handed and armed fighting with calisthenics, breathing exercises, meditation techniques, and elements of traditional Chinese medicine. It was in the late imperial period of Chinese history (the Ming and Qing dynasties, 1368–1912) that folk hand combat became a multifaceted system with features that go beyond the narrow framework of mere fighting. The surviving textual sources attest that during the Ming–Qing transition period, martial arts were perceived by many practitioners as a religious practice. Daoists and Buddhists alike often turned to hand- combat training in striving to achieve various religious goals, be it spiritual enlightenment or immortality. However, as recently discovered textual evidence suggests, it was Chinese local religion that disclosed the most intimate relations to martial arts practice.\nAn inseparable part of Chinese culture, the Chinese hand-combat tradition was (and still is) deeply rooted in rural life, and manifested itself in a particularly vivid way in the religious customs and ritualistic activities of the Chinese village. Chinese local religion, a highly intricate system in its own right, contains an evident martial element. For example, it is strongly believed that the employment of direct physical force against malevolent supernatural powers is not only possible but is sometimes as effective as any other ritual protective means, such as (spells) and (talismans). The folk belief that humans can best evil spirits with their bare hands is reflected in literary sources as early as the fourth

In Bhutan, buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum) is grown in non-rice growing regions and highland areas where cultivating other cereals is limited due to agro-geo-climate variations. Buckwheat is used throughout Bhutan in myriad culinary preparations, and of these, puta, a buckwheat noodle from the Bumthang Dzongkhag (Bumthang District), is very popular.

Mehrgan is an autumn harvest festival celebrated during or after gathering a harvest. In ancient times, Mehrgan marked the autumn equinox, and according to an old Iranian calendar, celebrated on the mehr day of the mehr month, equal to 8 October. In the Republic of Tajikistan 15 October is the official day of Mehrgan.

Bongsan Talchum, or the Bongsan mask-dance drama, was originally transmitted in Giryang-ri, Dongseon-myeon, Bongsan-gun, Hwanghae Province in the northern part of Korean Peninsula. However, with the relocation of administrative bodies, including the district office to Sariwon in 1915, the mask-dance drama and its transmission activities were also transferred to the area. In South Korea, Bongsan Talchum had been transmitted since its restoration by performers who originated from the North, including Jin-ok Kim and Cheon-sik Min, and was designated as Important Intangible Cultural Property No. 17 in 1967. The office of the Bongsan Mask Dance-Drama Preservation Society is currently housed within the Training Center for Important Intangible Cultural Properties in Seoul.

Federation of Handicraft Associations of Nepal was established in 1972 to enhance and promote handicrafts trade and industry. It is a service-oriented non-profit organization working with the private sector and the artisan community. It helps its members to improve their productivity, explores markets and introduces them to the international arena. It also acts as a liaison agency between its members and the government and other non-government organizations. The aim of the federation is to work towards a steady growth of handicrafts trade and industry. They encourage Nepalese artisans to adopt handicraft production as their profession by preserving Nepalese cultural heritage.

In 1995, pangalay dance guru Ligaya Fernando-Amilbangsa stopped teaching. The lack of diligence among students of traditional dance had caused her to lose her enthusiasm. Hopeful dancers requesting lessons at first failed to convince her to change her mind. But in January 1999 she decided to teach again, having collected a long list of applicants in the intervening years. Thus began a weekly community dance workshop in her suburban home in Antipolo City, Mega Manila. For those who joined the weekly sessions, learning from a dance master was exhilarating, especially on the eve of a new millennium. In 2000 the excitement over pangalay and other traditional dances of the Sulu Archipelago inspired the motley group of dance students under teacher Ligaya to formally establish the AlunAlun Dance Circle (ADC), with their mentor as company artistic director. ADC is a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving, conserving, and propagating pangalay, which, according to teacher Ligaya, has “the richest movement vocabulary among all Philippine dances, and the living link to the dance cultures in Asia.”