The Songkran Water Festival in Thailand
Songkran Water Festival
Spring celebrations can be found in many cultures throughout the world and are marked with special foods, traditions and time spent with family. How would it go over, though, if you marched up to Grandma during Easter dinner and soaked her with a high powered water gun or ran into a restaurant and poured a bucket of water on someone’s head? Not too well, we guess.
However, at the Songkran Festival in Thailand, which takes place each year from April 13th-15th, family members and strangers alike fully expect to be doused, sprinkled and even blasted with a large amount of water. In fact, they may be insulted if they don’t get drenched!
This festival is extremely important to the Thai people as it signifies new beginnings, cleansing and the start of a new year. Tourists, too, flock to Thailand during this time to cool off during the festivities, and hotel reservations must be made well in advance to ensure accommodations.
For three days, locals and visitors pour into the streets to soak each other with water using buckets, hoses, water guns, water balloons and anything else they can lay their hands on to dispense plain and scented water. Of course, ingesting great quantities of alcohol is also part of the festivities and it’s important to be aware of drunk drivers when navigating the roads. In fact, several hundred deaths are recorded during the festival each year, mostly from drunk driving accidents.
Luckily, April is the most scorching month in Thailand, so cooling off with water games is most welcome as air conditioning is not always the norm in many hotels and inns. Be careful, though, about people who may put chunks of ice in the water they throw; injuries can and do occur.
Besides manifesting as a soaking wet, drunken party, the Songkran festival is a religious observance, and cleansing statues of Buddha with scented water is common. Temple worship, solemn prayer and meditation accompany the religious portion of the festival. Large statues of Buddha are often paraded through the streets, decorated with flowers and flags.
Nightclubs and bars host water themed parties and invite well known bands and DJs to provide music for the ensuing dancing and revelry. Even the hotel staff participates in the action, throwing water on patrons and each other. (Lucky them; United States hotel workers would probably love the opportunity to throw water in some guests’ faces!)
Originally, Songkran was celebrated by pouring scented water over Buddha statues, then taking that same water, which was considered blessed, and gently pouring it over the hands of one’s elders. This showed reverence and respect while bestowing good luck and prosperity in the new year.
These days, many older folks prefer to get away from the chaos of the festival by retreating to the countryside with family, leaving the wet, drunken revelry to the younger set. Whether celebrated in peace and quiet or with the full spectrum of saturated fun, the festival remains a treasured and significant tradition.
