THAI HOLIDAYS AND FESTIVALS

California, apparently, knows how to party, but Thailand most definitely likes to have long weekends. There are more public holidays and festivals in Thailand than there are fat German paedophiles in Pattaya. Even then, government departments can usually contrive to add another one or two extra days off work at short notice each year because they forgot that there was an election scheduled or that it has been 12 months since the Minister of Public Holidays had a long weekend in Phuket with his mia noi (mistress).

As the date of many public holidays is determined by the lunar calendar and others are on fixed dates, there are many occasions when this means public holidays fall on a weekday, which transpires into everyone taking an extra day or two off and being away from the office for 4 or 5 days. Oh, sod it! Let’s have another week off. If any of the holidays fall on the weekend, there is a substitution day arranged for the following Monday.

These are the official public holidays and main times for taking the family to your condo in Hua Hin:

• Western New Year: December 31 / January 1. These are now official Thai public holidays, and why not?

• Makkha Bucha: February (full moon of the third lunar month). A Buddhist holy day, celebrating 1,250 enlightened monks coming to hear the Lord Buddha preach without having been summonsed.

• Chakri Day: April 6. Commemorates the founding of the current monarchical Chakri dynasty by Rama I.

• Songkran: April 13 – 15. Thai New Year celebrations. The government invariably adds another day because…, well... Well, why not? Songkran is supposed to last for 3 days but up country it can go on for a week or two if no-one keeps count. Pattaya has its own unique celebrations just to make sure that the celebrations keep going a little longer. (see Songkran)

• Labour Day: May 1. After two weeks back at work following Songkran, it’s the start of the May holiday season.

• Coronation Day: May 5. A public holiday to celebrate the anniversary of the coronation of His Majesty King Rama IX.

• Royal Ploughing Ceremony: May. Held in Bangkok to celebrate the beginning of the rice planting season.

• Visakkha Bucha: May (15th day of the waxing moon in the 6th lunar month). This is another Buddhist holy day that commemorates the coinciding dates of the Lord Buddha’s birth, enlightenment and death.

• Asalha Bucha: July (full moon). Honouring the first sermon given by the Lord Buddha.

• Khao Phansaa (Buddhist Lent): This is the beginning of the rainy season and the time when young men are ordained into the monk hood. Senior monks also cease their wanderings for three months, originally to prevent them trampling the rice fields during this vital time for the agricultural community. In Ubon Ratchatani, they celebrate with a special Candle Festival.

• Queen’s Birthday (Mother’s Day): August 12.

• Chulalungkorn Day: October 23. In honour of King Chulalungkorn (Rama V).

• King’s Birthday: December 5.

These are just a few more reasons to get the fairy lights out and call in sick:

• Bosang Umbrella Fair: January. Held in Chiang Mai to celebrate paper umbrellas.

• Phra BuddhaBaht Fair: January 31 to February 1. This is a major festival at Saraburi 236km north of Bangkok with music, drama and other events.

• Chinese New Year: February(ish). It’s not officially a holiday but thanks to the large Chinese population and ancestry in Thailand, nobody seems to let that stop them.

• Flower Carnival: February. Chiang Mai again. Flowers this time.

• Yasothon Bun Bangfai (Rocket) Festival: May. A time for men who should know better to pack gunpowder into bamboo and aim for the skies. Very dangerous but good fun.

• Fruit Fairs: May in Rayong, June in Chantaburi.

• Buffalo Races: October. Held in Chonburi, 80km east of Bangkok.

• Bridge on the River Kwai Week: October. Light and Sound shows held in Kanchanaburi at and around the infamous railway bridge over river.

• Loy Kratong: October/November. Full moon night with small boats (kratongs) being floated on Thailand’s waterways to honour the water deities. It’s especially fervent in Chiang Mai and colourful in Sukhothai, Ayutthaya and Bangkok. (see Loy Kratong)

• Elephant Roundup: November. Surin’s claim to fame.

There are so many more, but you get the general idea. Here are a couple of anecdotes to give you some perspective:

Songkran – excerpts from Naked Farang: Four Weddings and a Coup

My first trip to Sakhon Nakhon was a real eye opener. It was April 2000, and I was going to spend the Songkran festival with Penh and her family. Songkran is the Thai New Year. It officially lasts for 3 days, but in Sakhon Nakhon it goes on for almost 2 weeks. The purists will tell you that it is a time for merit making and thoughtful reflection as the Thai New Year approaches. It is a time to respect families, elders, teachers, monks and Buddha images through making offerings and gently cleansing them with scented water. These days, it mostly involves getting drunk and having mad water fights. I suppose it was inevitable really. Just look at what happened to Christmas!!! Songkran is a lot of fun, especially as it’s during the hottest part of the year. Thais love fun and can always find a reason to celebrate something. They have 3 new years every year. First, there is the international New Year. Next comes Chinese New Year, and finally there is Songkran. In fact, with the King and Queen’s birthdays, other royal holidays, Loy Kratong, National Labour Day, various Buddhist holy days, Halloween and Christmas, there’s always an excuse to get the fairy lights out and have a party. It’s a pity they don’t know about Papua New Guinea’s Independence and Constitution Day, because September gets a bit boring.

The next morning I bought a large box of Chang beer from the village store, and Penh’s dear ma proved what a wizard of fermentation she was by bringing out a huge bucket of satho she had prepared. It was Songkran. Actually, it was still a few days away, but hey, who’s going to know the difference this far from civilization. We all sat around on the floor in the living room drinking beer and satho and eating sticky rice with grilled chicken. The garage-sized front door was wide open, and everyone from the village who walked past saw the farang and decided to come and say hello. When they saw the food and drinks, they decided to stay. Word soon got around and by mid morning, the house was full and most of the village was drunk.

By the early afternoon, all the beer, satho and food was gone, as were many of the guests. It was time for the rest of us to gather as many water-dispensing vessels as we could find, pile into the box pick up truck and head off in search of Songkran. Most of us sat in the back cabin with the back doors open. As we headed into town, we got a few soakings from roadside revellers. We tried in vain to return the favour, but failed miserably due to the cramped conditions and the fact that all we had were some shallow bowls and two buckets of water.

When we arrived in Pankorn, we headed straight for the market. I bought several water pistols for the kids and some heavy-duty looking water guns for the adults. Everyone was decidedly unimpressed. All they wanted were the pump guns that looked like bicycle pumps. These could suck up a decent amount of water that could then be sprayed back out at high speed. I bought a load of those and, while Penh filled up our buckets from a hosepipe, I made a quick diversion to a shop to buy some more beer. Now we were ready!

We drove around, now giving as good as we were getting. Occasionally, Noi’s boyfriend would just pull up in the middle of town, and we would all jump out and attack another group of revellers. Being one of very few farangs in the area, I was a prime target for every single pump gun in the province. It was mayhem. I loved it.

After driving around town for a while, we headed out into the surrounding countryside. There were three main assembly points for Songkran activities. One was next to, and in, a river. The other two were at irrigation canals. All the sites had people selling food and beer, and everyone was in party mood.
We’d swim and play (fully-clothed, of course) in the river or canals, have water fights with other groups and eat and drink to excess. This would go on until late afternoon when we’d head home drunk, exhausted and sun burnt.

For the three Songkrans that I spent in Sakhon Nakhon, the same routine was repeated on a daily basis for almost two weeks: first, breakfast and alcohol, and then all into a pick up to find some action before returning home to recover our strength for the next day

Loy Kratong – excerpts from Naked Farang: Four Weddings and a Coup

I ducked as another rocket whizzed past my ear and fire continued to rain down from above. All around me people were running and screaming. There was no respite and no escape. I looked around frantically and kept moving so as not to become an easy target. An old woman nearby wasn’t so lucky and took a direct hit from one of the stray rockets. This was FUN!

The rockets were small fireworks and the fire was melting plastic from airborne lanterns. I was in Chiang Mai where I had stumbled into Loy Kratong - Northern style.

After an overnight train ride from Bangkok, I found a cheap and cheerful guest house in the old city of Chiang Mai, where I ate, got cleaned up and rested.

After spending the afternoon getting to know a couple of other travellers in my guest house, we headed out together for the evening’s entertainment oblivious to what was lurking in the falling darkness. If this had been a movie, there would definitely have been a shaky long shot of my new friends and me as we made our innocent way along Chiang Mai’s backstreets, with the camera mimicking a stalker, ducking behind walls whenever we glanced towards him. There would have been the sound of strange, heavy breathing and perhaps a special effect to replicate the stalker’s inhuman vision.

As we chatted and walked, there appeared to be nothing out of the ordinary until we approached one of the four canals that surround old Chiang Mai city centre and that had formed a defensive moat in more unstable times. The street that ran along the inner side of the canal was packed with people, all craning to see something. We could just make out enough through and over the crowd to distinguish beauty queens passing on floats, all fixed smiles and flying flowers.

After peacefully and respectfully watching the procession pass, the animal instinct took over and the crowd suddenly and without warning deteriorated into a lawless mob. By the time we had walked 50 metres from the procession, we had passed through some William Burroughsesqe portal from Chiang Mai to Mogadishu. The movie had changed from The King and I to Black Hawk Down so seamlessly that Tarantino himself could have been directing it.

We were swept up in the mass hysteria of riotous revelry, taken over by and indistinguishable from the beast that had stalked us and into whose lair we had wandered. We were unarmed, and we were right in the danger zone. It was like being in an extreme, ultra-violent paintball fight without any protective clothing. It was like Songkran but with the water and talcum powder replaced by rockets and fire. It was unadulterated, dangerous fun - the kind of fun that makes you laugh hysterically as you balance on the edge of oblivion wondering if you’ll ever come back. There’s nothing like a sudden rush of adrenalin to send you on a natural high. Loy Kratong in Chiang Mai is certainly an experience that I will never forget.

I had never even heard of Loy Kratong until that night. I have since spent many a Loy Kratong in Bangkok, but none have ever come anywhere near that night in Chiang Mai for wild abandon and anarchy.

Loy Kratong is a Thai festival held on the full moon in the twelfth month of the lunar calendar (usually November) and celebrated throughout the country. It is believed to have originated in India and arrived in Thailand during the Sukhothai period (1220 – 1350BC). Loy Kratong is principally a festival honouring the water goddess, Phra Mae Khongkha. Loy means “float” and kratong is the name of small rafts that are released on rivers, canals, lakes, the sea or any convenient body of water, including swimming pools in the top hotels!

The kratongs were originally made from slices of banana tree trunks, but these days Styrofoam tends to be more popular and, surprisingly, is encouraged by many local mayors as their clean up crews find Styrofoam kratongs easier to catch and recycle than banana tree kratongs. The kratongs are elaborately decorated with banana leaves, flowers, incense sticks and candles. Thais may place small amounts of food, money or sometimes even gold on the kratongs to honour and thank Phra Mae Khongkha for providing water throughout the year, and to request forgiveness for abusing and polluting her. This explains why lots of small boys can be seen swimming in rivers and lakes on Loy Kratong night. Thais also often put nail or hair clippings in the kratongs to symbolise floating away all their ill feelings.

Apart from floating kratongs, there are often beauty contests, as I had seen in Chiang Mai. These contests celebrate a young queen of the Sukhothai kingdom, Nang Noppamas, who is believed to have been the first person to make a kratong and float it. There are also many large firework displays on Loy Kratong night, and if you happen to be in Chiang Mai, you might find that you inadvertently become a part of the pseudo-military tattoo.

While Loy Kratong is a national festival, it is celebrated with particular verve in Thailand’s past and present capitals and city states of Sukhothai, where it originated; Ayutthaya; Bangkok; and Chiang Mai. In Chiang Mai, people also release floating lanterns, khom loy, into the night sky. The khom loy are usually wire frames covered with paper and supporting a candle to provide the hot air that gives them their lift. The candle is sometimes fixed to the frame with melted plastic, which re-heats as the candle burns down and causes the rain of fire I later experienced.

Loy Kratong is quite probably Thailand’s most beautiful festival, but in Chiang Mai, it is also the most dangerous. Don’t let that put you off, though. You only live once and your life will be enriched for the experience - if you survive!

In Bangkok, it’s much more sober. Pim and I usually walk down to Lumpini Park, buy a kratong and then float it on the lake. We watch it in meaningful contemplation for almost an entire minute before a young boy snags it and reels it in to see if there is any money in it, before he re-sells it. Talk about re-cycling!

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