14/04/2019
The Songkran festival, or what the locals call “Pawaeni Pi Mai Mueang” (Northern Thai New Year), is a major celebration with lots of smiles. The children get a chance to throw water on each other without being scolded. Adults participate in it as a major alms offering event of the year. They would enthusiastically prepare offering items and carry them to temples.
There are many rites and ceremonies performed during the festival, all related closely to the life of the people and their relationship with nature as well as auspicious beings around them. The ceremonies will start from the 13th to the 15th of April with ceremonies as follows;
The 13th or Sang Khan Long is considered the end of the year. Gunshots and bangs of firecrackers could be heard at dawn. The villagers do this to chase away the evil spirits of Pu Sangkhan and Ya Sangkran. On this same day all houses are cleaned and tidied up and the people will clean their body and wear brand new clothes and burn all the trash. People will go to temples to worship and sprinkle holy water on Buddha image.
The 14th of April or Wan Nao is the day people would avoid doing bad things. They will not scold one another or cause fights. If fights occur, the whole year will be cursed. Besides being called Wan Nao it is also a “Wan Da” or preparation day for the alms offering to be performed the next day. People will go to the market for the needed goods. In the afternoon young men and women will go to dig sand from the river to create sand pagodas or chedis and decorate them with colorful rectangular flags or Tungs (Local dialect). People in the past would carry silver bowls or buckets down to the Ping River and splash water with fun. The sand gathering on the Wan Nao is considered a merit performing and the person will be blessed as much as the amount of sand they have gathered. Some people believe that it is a way to pay for their sins or karma done both consciously and unconsciously like the amount of sand stuck to the shoes when people leave the temple each time. The sand is kept for later use in the construction works of the temple.
The 15th of April or Phaya Wan day is the beginning of the New Year. It is the day for presenting the grand offerings. The locals will start their new life by offering “than khan khao” or rice bowl offerings to pass on their goodness to their ancestors, relatives or friends who have passed away. Rites of paying respect to the ancestral relics are performed along with sprinkling holy water on the Buddha images and paying worships to the temple ascribed to the worshiper’s birth year.
The afternoon is the time for paying respect to the elders. It is a time to remember the offences they have done and ask them for forgiveness and for them to have a good year from then on. The elders will tie sacred threads around the younger one’s wrist to show that they have accepted the respect or apologies and give them a blessing. The elements of the rite are a bowl of flowers and puffed rice, candles, incense, holy water that is a mixture of turmeric water and soap pods, betel nut and betel peppers, tea leaves, ci******es and snacks along with fruit and milk or other healthy foods. Sometimes clothes, wraparound skirts and checkered clothes are given along with the other ritual goods. A kind of present popular today is giving towels to the elders because they are handy and practical for everyday use. For Chiang Mai, this ceremony is held for the governor too, as a respect given to him. Besides the officials in the city, the outer district officers would set up processions to join in the ceremony. The holy water sprinkling on the Buddha images and the rites of paying respect rites to the elders can be performed many days after the New Year Day.
