Champ Turkish dogs attract crowd in Ethnosport Festival

By Fatih Erel

ISTANBUL (AA) - The world champions Turkish shepherd dogs attracted a great deal of attention in the Ethnosport Culture Festival at Istanbul's Ataturk Airport on Friday.

The Ethnosport Culture Festival continued at Istanbul's Ataturk Airport as thousands gathered to practice and watch the traditional sports.

The festival also introduced several breeds of Turkey's shepherd dogs -- including Akbash, Kangal, Aksaray Malaklisi, Grizzly, and Black Sea -- Akin Tulubas, a national president of International Eurasia Dog Breeds Federation, told Anadolu Agency on Friday.

The visitors had the opportunity to see and take photos with the champion dogs.

"We registered and certified these dogs at international level. Our Kangal shepherd dogs won two world championships and one 'champions of world champions' award in 2018 and our Grizzly Shepherd Dog became European champion in Italy," Tulubas said.

"In the festival, we are introducing Turkish dog breeds," he added.

Organized by the World Ethnosport Confederation, the festival is held for the fourth time with 16 nations participating, including guest country Argentina this year.

The festival, which kicked off on Thursday, is set to run through Oct. 6.

Nearly 1,000 athletes compete in the festival in 12 traditional sports -- including archery, oil wrestling, belt wrestling, mounted javelin throwing, mancala and horseback archery.

The oil wrestling festivities alone last for four days with a total of 300 contenders.

The fourth Ethnosport Cultural Festival is also presenting a dazzling array of traditional cuisines from across the globe for festival-goers to savor.

The event features the cuisines of 16 countries from all around the world.

Apart from sports, children are taking part in 40 traditional children’s games and there are also 60 handicraft workshops.