Buffalo honoured in Vietnamese head-butting festival: 20-09-2007
A buffalo has been crowned as a head-butting champion at an annual Vietnamese festival.
The water buffalo, known as number 26, was declared the winner after successfully making it through a series of qualifying bouts at the event held in Do Son near the north-eastern city of Haiphong, reports Reuters.
Number 26's owner Hoang Dinh Hieu told the crowd: "I'm very happy to become champion today. Before the tournament, I had only hoped to make progress and I never thought my buffalo would be a winner."
However, the future is not as bright for 26 as all of the finalists are slaughtered before being sold off outside the stadium for between 400,000 dong ($25) and 700,000 dong ($43) per kg.
Buffalo fighting has a strong tradition in Vietnam dating back several hundreds of years. It is now so popular that tournaments attract lucrative sponsorship deals as well as being broadcast live on a local television channel.
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