Local festivals

The project named “LOcal products Festivals and Tourism development in cross-border cooperation Greece-Bulgaria” (The LOFT Project), funded under the European Cooperation Territorial Programme “Greece – Bulgaria 2007 – 2013”, aims at: (i) promoting and reinforcing local cultural events, directly linked to local production, by building on synergies between existing local festivals and implementing a set of actions to form & sustain a network of festivals organisers; (ii) further promoting local/ traditional products. In this respect, the project examines ways to protect and promote traditional products and production through a road show travelling in the local festivals of the region and through joint activities including a contest on local festivals and products. The LOFT Project envisages also to provide an interactive web-GIS tool (a web-based map) of the fairs and festival in the in the Programme eligible area.
The current achievements of the LOFT project include the elaboration of three major deliverables: (i) a Study on the Cultural & Historical Value of Local Products; (ii) a preparatory report for the Map of the Local Fairs / Festivals on Local Products; (iii) Master Plan for Cross-Border Collaboration & Development.

Idrisyayla Village, which the study focused on,is a residential area of Rumelian immigrants coming to Eskisehir with migration waves at the end of the 19th century. With this study, it was aimed that traditional cuisine of the area and effect of this culture to spatial formation would be examined and evaluated.
The tradition of “Beet Brewing, Molasses-Paste Production”, which holds the impacts of cuisine culture of Rumelian immigrants in Idrisyayla, has been preserved as a living culture up to now. Preservation of beet plant by brewing and making it like syrup by boiling its water, social life in Idrisyayla Village, which is very suitable for agriculture, economic status, cuisine culture, preservation and evaluation methods, may vary from region to region. Idrisyayla villagers, known with beet molasses or popularity of their “paste”, provide diversity that reflects their own culture with the festivals occurring brewing paste made with co-op while maintaining traditional production methods. Co-op production provided transmission of knowledge and experience to the other generations and it was very influential in preservation of taste of Idrisyayla paste. Dietary habit of Eskisehir Idrisyayla Village people coming from old times, Beet Brewing, associated with their customs and traditions, Molasses-Paste Production rituals are about to be removed from memories as productions to be maintained by several families. The fact that this tradition continuing with the information obtained by previous generations is about to be forgotten increases the importance of the study.
With this study, it was aimed that Eskisehir Seyitgazi district, Idrisyayla Village traditional cuisine culture and the places that are the reflections of this culture would be examined and evaluated. Idrisyayla Village is a residential area of Rumelian immigrants that came to Eskisehir with immigration waves at the end of the 19th century. Idrisyayla Village is an attractive residential area with impressive natural landscape elements and authentic local identity. Idrisyayla Village, with single storey, yard-type houses built from wood, mud or rubble stone suitable for sloping village area, preserved its residence character to a great extent. Social life, economic status, palatal delight, food preservation and evaluation methods in Idrisyayla Village holding the traces of Rumelian immigrant culture in Eskisehir may differ from region to region.
Materials of the study are responses obtained at the end of the interviews with the source people representing local culture, observations, documentation with photographs and source researches. In this context, meetings were carried out with “interview” and “panel interview” from qualitative research methods. Sound and/or video records of the interviews were deciphered and then were evaluated under themes by coding.