Irreecha

The season it marks

June to September is the rainy season, called Ganna, and Oromo tradition treats it as a hard stretch of the year. Rivers rise and floods can drown people and cattle, ruin crops and reach into homes. Visiting is difficult when the water is high, so families and friends may lose touch. The harvest taken in January is nearly gone and the next one is not ready, so some households go short of food. Malaria and other illnesses spread in the wet months. In Birraa, the season after the rains, maize ripens along with potato and barley, and the shortage ends. The feast turns on that change.

Origins and the date

According to Oromo accounts, the festival began at Mormor in Oromia during the era of the Gadaa known as Melbaa. The day that closed that period, remembered as a time of hunger and want, was fixed by the Gadaa lunar calendar to a Sunday as September gives way to October. Oromo people today have set that day apart as a national thanksgiving. Since the reckoning is lunar, the date shifts from year to year and does not sit on the same calendar day.

At the sacred lakes

The gathering always happens beside water, at lakes that are held sacred. Hora Finfinne and Hora Harsadi are the two the sources name, and others lie elsewhere in Oromia where the festival is also kept. A single Irreecha can bring together hundreds of thousands of people. The lakeside is also a meeting place: the day is a reunion after months in which rain and swollen rivers made visiting hard. Oromo communities in North America and Europe hold their own Irreecha as well, far from these waters.

Today and change

Irreecha is a public holiday, and the sources call it the biggest cultural festival in Africa. Crowds at the lakes have run into the hundreds of thousands. Addis Ababa, the capital, hosted the 2019 celebration, and Debre Zeit followed it. Roughly 5,000 people came to the 2020 gathering at Addis Ababa, a number the sources tie to political tension and the pandemic. On 2 October 2016 a stampede at the festival killed between 55 and 300 people and left many injured. Local accounts blamed the security forces for starting it.

How Irreecha is kept

People come to the lake in family and neighbourhood groups, carrying grass and flowers. At the water's edge the plants are dipped in, and those taking part sprinkle the lake water over themselves and leave the grass and flowers behind in the water. Prayers go up to Waaqa in thanks for the past year. Afterwards the crowd celebrates together, since relatives kept apart by the rainy months can meet again, and the sources say the day draws people closer to one another.

When and where

Irreecha comes once a year at the close of the rainy season. The date is worked out from the Gadaa lunar calendar, which places it on a Sunday as September turns to October. The holiday infobox lists it as falling in October. It is not fixed to the same calendar day each year.

It is kept in Oromia, Ethiopia, at sacred lakes such as Hora Finfinne and Hora Harsadi, and at others across the region. Bishoftu and Addis Ababa are the two towns the sources name for it. Oromo communities abroad also hold the festival, particularly in North America and Europe, where diaspora Oromos live.

What Irreecha means

The day is a giving of thanks to Waaqa for the year that has passed, and a welcome for the season of ripe crops that follows the hard, wet months. Oromo communities hold that it brings relatives and neighbours back together after a stretch when travel was impossible, and that it strengthens the bonds between them. It is also a moment of turning: the rains end, maize and other crops are ready, and the shortage that some households faced through the winter is over.

Irreecha dates: 2026, 2027, 2028

This date follows the moon or a local calendar and can move by a day, so check with a local source nearer the time.

Questions people ask about Irreecha

See also

DiwaliA five-day festival of lights celebrated across India and its diaspora to mark the victory of light over darkness.HoliA spring festival of colours and bonfires that marks the end of winter and the triumph of good over evil.JaanipäevEstonia's midsummer night of bonfires, song and fortune-telling, on 23 and 24 JuneKishiwada Danjiri MatsuriA high-speed festival of wooden shrine floats pulled through Kishiwada, Japan

Good reading and sources

• In Pictures: Ethiopia’s Oromos celebrate Irreecha festivalAl Jazeera, Article
• In pictures: Ethiopia's Oromos celebrate thanksgivingBBC, Article
• In Pictures: Ethiopia’s Oromos celebrate Irreecha festivalAl Jazeera, Article
• In pictures: Ethiopia's Oromos celebrate thanksgivingBBC, Article

• Irreechaa on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.