The celebration of Shoton Festival has been set to hold in Lhasa from August 30 to September 5, according to the Organizing Committee of Shoton Festival. It will be a pageant for tourists and local people to experience distinct Tibetan culture through drinking sour milk and watching Tibetan opera.

Shoton Festival, as one of great traditional festivals in Lhasa, is also known as Sour Milk Drinking Festival. "sho" means the sour milk and "ton" has the meaning of banquet in Tibetan. Dating back to 11th century, the celebration of Shoton Festival was originally a religious activity in which secular people sacrificed sour milk to monks who had just finished spiritual cultivation in the closet. In the second half of 17th century, it changed to a festival for entertainment and was also called "Buddha Painting Unfolding Festival" and "Tibetan Opera Festival".

Nowadays, the festival has been enriched with art performances, sports games, business meetings and tourism apart from traditional custom.

The theme of Shoton Festival in this year is to introduce the long and prosperous history and culture as well as the marvelous tourism resources of Tibet and show political, cultural and social accomplishment, sources from the Organizing Committee.

Shoton Festival has won lots of awards and ranked on the list of national intangible legacies since it was hosted by the local government of Lhasa.