Festival hat

To make sure I don't miss my hat this time... When is the finale? And how do I recognize it? Do I have to talk to some sort of NPC to get it?

Can someone explain to me how to obtain it?

wiki about festival 2008:
The emperor arrives and speaks for a bit. During this time if you have 250 tokens in your inventory, they will be exchanged for a Grasping Mask, even if you already have a grasping mask. If you have multiple stacks of tokens in your inventory, you will get multiple masks, so plan ahead accordingly. Be sure to talk to Ludor the Festival hat maker so all of your characters will be able to use the mask and it won't take up space in storage when you are done wearing it.

A short time later, Celestial Charges will start appearing. The goal of this mini-game is to get the charges to the Imperial Sorcerers before the actors dressed as a Grasp of Insanity intercept you. Intercepted characters will be "killed" and resurrected in the open field by storage. For each charge you collect you will receive a Victory Token. If you are in a district where the players collect more celestial charges than the Grasp of Insanity you will receive 1 Festival Prize every ~70 seconds for the next 15 minutes for a total of 12 to 27 (depending on unknown factors) with a mode of 13.

The Emporor appears every 2 hours on Sunday. Be in Shing Jea Monestary with 250 victory tokens in your inventory when he arrives, help win the game thingie, and you'll automatically get the mask in exchange for the tokens. Easy-peasy!

More info here: www.guildwars.com

Is it every even hour?

Well, I should be able to just stand afk in Shing Jea Monestary with 250 victory tokens and then get the mask? Or talk with Imperial Supply Master Kagno up to a week after the event has closed?

Thx for the answers so far.

Just read here http://www.guildwars.com/events/ingame/dragon_festival/

Read the guildwars home page. Although it won't do much help.

it says the 11th....but the festival ends on the 5th I think.

O.o

You need 250 victory tokens to get the mask. If you don't make one of the emperor's visits (every 2 hrs beginning at 2am Pacific Time) on Sunday, July 5th, then you can visit the NPC in Shing Jea on Monday.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Dragon_Festival_2009

If you read the timetable it says the final event is the 5th,, when the emporor ppears every 2 hours, but that from 6-12th "Imperial Supply Master Kagno appears and remains in Shing Jea Monastery to exchange Victory Tokens for the new mask."

On a related note: is it possible to afk Nine Rings and still receive Festival Prizes?

I don't believe so but it sure would be neat.

So long as your district wins, it doesn't matter if you participated or not, you still get festival prizes. Of course you run the risk of losing if everyone else is doing the same and no-one's running charges