Songkran, the traditional festival celebrating the Thai New Year falls on April 13th and lasts for three days. This area event has profound importance as it observes the special time in which Thais show their reverence and respect to the Lord Buddha and their elders.
A time for regeneration and personal purification, Songkran also allows for inner reflection, compassion, charity and harmony; it is a time of thanksgiving as friendships and family ties are renewed. Bathing Buddha statues with sacred water, and pouring it over an elder’s hands is a ritual conveying gratitude for all the blessings given and received in the past year along with other outward demonstrations of respect.
Reflecting on the thanksgiving spirit, monks receive alms; the disadvantaged collect donations, and many people become involved in community clean-up campaigns of temples, parks and other public areas.
As evidenced in local media advertising, major department store sales for linens, tableware, furniture and cleaning items at reduced prices, bank on the ‘spring cleaning’ traditions during Songkran in the awareness of the festival’s meaning of renewal and purification.
Songkran, a word from the Sanskrit meaning ‘moving into’, observes the beginning of a new solar year; marking the conclusion of a twelve-month cycle. The event symbolizes purification and the removal of evil and adversity with a fresh, untainted launch into the New Year. Water, the icon of Songkran, accordingly represents purity, transparency and cleanliness.
Elders are ‘blessed’ with sprinkled water -- in their homes and in the wats (temples) -- a tradition started as a way to make merit as well as to acknowledge and honor ancestors by means of pouring water into their cupped hands. In the long traditional past, actual bathing took place as the younger generation helped their elders take a bath, exchanging old garments for new-fangled ones as a sign of deference at the time of the New Year.
Nowadays, though, the festival has fallen into one big water-throwing parade and anyone venturing out onto the streets is likely to get a crystal-clear purifying drench - all in good, ‘clean’ fun. Thais celebrate without restraint, much enthusiasm and dancing as the water-throwing traditions shift from polite water-pistol sprinkles to a dowsing from a garden hose in residential areas, or accurate water mortars dispatched cheerfully and with a wave from high rise buildings. This is the crest of the hot season here in Thailand and water is welcome to a certain extent.
We saw people roaming and dancing in the streets with buckets of water as they drenched each other and anyone passing by on foot or in cars.
Water throwing is a happy event during the holiday and it’s expected. According to the local English newspaper, passengers in public buses are the most sought after targets; buses being ambushed at strategic spots such as traffic lights.
I also read that today’s accent on fun water-throwing rather than on Songkran’s spiritual aspects have incited critisism from the more conservative. Apparently, recent calls to contain the water festivities have fallen on deaf ears - even though accidents attributed to extreme behavior - are causing alarm and concern.
On a more contemporary note, Songkran reminds Thais to be kind and charitable by encouraging goodwill and the gentle pouring of water on one another.
Songkran is set in motion with cleanliness, respect and reverence shown from the lowest to the highest person in rank, so acknowledged in order of importance for their devoutness, wisdom, philanthropy, worldly experience and compassion; for example, the Buddha, royalty, grandparents, parents and other elders, teachers, employers, etc.
Reverent as the rituals are though, after respects are paid, the Songkran procession picks up into a fest of vibrant color, song, and dance, complete with traditional food, drink and, the oasis of the water throwing games to beat the heat.
Additionally, the ancient capital city of Ayhuttaya provides the stage from which participants enjoy the best water fest of them all as they sit astride elephants blasting water from their trunks aimed at others caught in similar lofty circumstances.
What we loved most about this year’s Songkran (our first), was the fact that the masses working in the capital returned home to their provinces and rural areas to celebrate the festival, thus leaving Bangkok momentarily deserted allowing for stress-free cruising through the city in the dry sanctuary of our Jeep. Maybe next year we’ll stride the sidewalks (!)
By Edie Wilcox@ Written April 2006
Monday
The Songkran Festival or Thai New Year
Songkran, the traditional festival celebrating the Thai New Year falls on April 13th and lasts for three days. This area event has profound importance as it observes the special time in which Thais show their reverence and respect to the Lord Buddha and their elders.
A time for regeneration and personal purification, Songkran also allows for inner reflection, compassion, charity and harmony; it is a time of thanksgiving as friendships and family ties are renewed. Bathing Buddha statues with sacred water, and pouring it over an elder’s hands is a ritual conveying gratitude for all the blessings given and received in the past year along with other outward demonstrations of respect.
Reflecting on the thanksgiving spirit, monks receive alms; the disadvantaged collect donations, and many people become involved in community clean-up campaigns of temples, parks and other public areas.
As evidenced in local media advertising, major department store sales for linens, tableware, furniture and cleaning items at reduced prices, bank on the ‘spring cleaning’ traditions during Songkran in the awareness of the festival’s meaning of renewal and purification.
Songkran, a word from the Sanskrit meaning ‘moving into’, observes the beginning of a new solar year; marking the conclusion of a twelve-month cycle. The event symbolizes purification and the removal of evil and adversity with a fresh, untainted launch into the New Year. Water, the icon of Songkran, accordingly represents purity, transparency and cleanliness.
Elders are ‘blessed’ with sprinkled water -- in their homes and in the wats (temples) -- a tradition started as a way to make merit as well as to acknowledge and honor ancestors by means of pouring water into their cupped hands. In the long traditional past, actual bathing took place as the younger generation helped their elders take a bath, exchanging old garments for new-fangled ones as a sign of deference at the time of the New Year.
Nowadays, though, the festival has fallen into one big water-throwing parade and anyone venturing out onto the streets is likely to get a crystal-clear purifying drench - all in good, ‘clean’ fun. Thais celebrate without restraint, much enthusiasm and dancing as the water-throwing traditions shift from polite water-pistol sprinkles to a dowsing from a garden hose in residential areas, or accurate water mortars dispatched cheerfully and with a wave from high rise buildings. This is the crest of the hot season here in Thailand and water is welcome to a certain extent.
We saw people roaming and dancing in the streets with buckets of water as they drenched each other and anyone passing by on foot or in cars.
Water throwing is a happy event during the holiday and it’s expected. According to the local English newspaper, passengers in public buses are the most sought after targets; buses being ambushed at strategic spots such as traffic lights.
I also read that today’s accent on fun water-throwing rather than on Songkran’s spiritual aspects have incited critisism from the more conservative. Apparently, recent calls to contain the water festivities have fallen on deaf ears - even though accidents attributed to extreme behavior - are causing alarm and concern.
On a more contemporary note, Songkran reminds Thais to be kind and charitable by encouraging goodwill and the gentle pouring of water on one another.
Songkran is set in motion with cleanliness, respect and reverence shown from the lowest to the highest person in rank, so acknowledged in order of importance for their devoutness, wisdom, philanthropy, worldly experience and compassion; for example, the Buddha, royalty, grandparents, parents and other elders, teachers, employers, etc.
Reverent as the rituals are though, after respects are paid, the Songkran procession picks up into a fest of vibrant color, song, and dance, complete with traditional food, drink and, the oasis of the water throwing games to beat the heat.
Additionally, the ancient capital city of Ayhuttaya provides the stage from which participants enjoy the best water fest of them all as they sit astride elephants blasting water from their trunks aimed at others caught in similar lofty circumstances.
What we loved most about this year’s Songkran (our first), was the fact that the masses working in the capital returned home to their provinces and rural areas to celebrate the festival, thus leaving Bangkok momentarily deserted allowing for stress-free cruising through the city in the dry sanctuary of our Jeep. Maybe next year we’ll stride the sidewalks (!)
By Edie Wilcox@ Written April 2006
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