S

urakarta (commonly known as Solo) is hosting a festival of Javanese traditional games for children this weekend, which is expected to attract 200 participants. The festival is being organized by the Suryo Sumirat Mangkunegaran dance group at the Plaza Sriwedari.
 'There will be many kinds of traditional games on offer and songs to accompany the games that are rarely heard today,' said Esti Andrini, the organizing chairman, as quoted by tempo.co recently.
Esti said teachers and students were also invited to watch the festival.
Commenting on the festival, Surakarta Tourism and Culture Agency head Widdi Sri Hanto said the traditional games should be reintroduced as they contained moral values that children nowadays could not get by playing interactive games, such as video games.
'Traditional games teach us how to be honest and maintain solidarity with our friends, while video games tend to encourage our children to be individualistic,' he said.(nai/dic)