Northern Ireland’s largest cultural diversity festival is making a welcome return later this month, inviting the world back into the heart of the city with an amazing line-up of global music, dance, art, theatre, wellbeing and food.
Belfast Mela takes place from August 20-28 after a break of two years due to the global pandemic.
The celebrations will include a carnival procession, world food market, silk road supper club and tea walking tours, culminating in the festival finale in Botanic Gardens.
Read more: Belfast Mela returns to Botanic Gardens for week of celebrations in August
This year’s Mela Festival, sponsored by Sensata Technologies, will be bigger and better than ever before taking place over eight days.
It all kicks off with a spectacular Mela Carnival on Saturday 20 August through the streets of Belfast and featuring more than 40 cultural groups with spectacular new carnival floats including a 4.6m high Rooster, which is a symbol of Polish culture.
That will be followed by daily Mela Plus events across Belfast, leading up to the annual Mela Day extravaganza in Botanic Gardens in south Belfast on Sunday 28 August.
The largest celebration of cultural diversity on the island of Ireland was officially launched at a colourful event at Banana Block in East Belfast on Tuesday with classical Indian dance and Mexican folk performances, along with Elephant stilt walkers.
Nisha Tandon, founder of Belfast Mela and Director of ArtsEkta is delighted to be back with the first full festival since the pandemic and the most ambitious programme to date.
"From outdoor spectacles, late night music, pop up food events and walking tours, to exhibitions, wellbeing days, film screenings and theatre there is really something for everyone in what is now the biggest celebration of cultural diversity on the island of Ireland," she said.
"We are so proud to have been working with hundreds of artists, thousands of participants and are looking forward to welcoming up to 60,000 attendees to events over eight days."
The Full Mela 2022 programme is available here.
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