Songkran Festival in Thailand, also known as Thailand’s New Year festival, is usually held in April 13. People in Thailand celebrates the festival by throwing water to each other from the media of water gun, balloons, or even buckets. Throwing water to each other is meant to wash away the bad luck or illness from people’s bodies. This tradition is derived from the monks’ habit of splashing water to the people after praying in the temple in the purpose of cleaning the people minds and body from evil spirit or dirtiness.

Songkran Festival Thailand

Different areas in Thailand celebrate the Songkran festival in a different period of time. Some of them only celebrate it for 3 days while some others celebrate the festival for 10 days in a row. The first day of celebration, April 13 is considered as the end of the year, and the next day as the beginning of New Year in Thailand. Even though people know that they will be soaking wet, almost all people in Thailand are out of their house during the festival. They even prepare special water weapons to arm themselves while joining the festivities of the water festival.

Songkran Festival Thailand

One legend tells that in the past time, most people in Thailand were farmers, and they were waiting for the rain to hose the crops. Those people believed that the rain was made by dragons who took the water from the sea and spurted it to the land. The idea of Songkran festival was taken from this legend that if people throw more water, then more rain will come to shower the land. Although now people don’t really care about making rain, they still hold the festival to enjoy the pleasure of water fight happened only once in a year. As a matter of fact, the Songkran festival or the water festival is not only celebrated in Thailand but also in the other Southeast Asian countries like Myanmar, Cambodia, and Malaysia. Though the dates when the festival takes place are sometimes different from one country to the others.

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