Loy Krathong

Friday 2nd November 2001

Robs -

Well at the end of my last message I mentioned that I heard a temple band start up outside the internet cafe.

LOY KRATHONG is a pagan river festival - to give thanks to the river goddess for the gift of life for the previous year, and ask forgiveness for sins etc. It is always held on the night of the full moon in November, but it is a 4-day festival which just gets more and more intense. Unfortunately I heard it as "LYCRA THONG", and I was a bit disappointed that when I went out wearing one on the first night I faced considerable public disquiet.

The whole of Chiang Mai goes mad for Loy Krathong, with parades, fireworks, enormous lanterns floating off into the sky and all kinds of contests held in the main square (Thai kick boxing, Miss Chiang Mai, local bands). It is centred around the Ping River which goes through the town; the river is about 300 metres wide and quite fast flowing.

When I left the internet cafe, to my surprise a colourful Loy Krathong parade had formed in the little road by our guest house (I know I was in there for a long time, but STILL!). The band that I had heard was a (I think) Buddhist temple band of young Thai boys between about 7 and 15 years old, dressed in a light blue martial arts type of uniform. They were banging a large drum , clashing cymbals and occasionally doing a strange dance which looked like Thai breakdancing, except that as they moved around, all in sync, they hit the road with their cymbals.

We followed the parades on Tuesday and Wednesday - each day they got BIGGER, the floats more outlandish and colourful. The highlight was Thursday, which unfortunately we missed.

The timetable and route was the same both days. After hanging around for a couple of hours the parade moved off. There were about 50 different sections of the parade (different clubs? temples? schools?), in each was between four and thirty people, and the array of costumes and colours was stunning. There was constant music, drums, cymbals and bells, from different parts of the parade. There was a group of three ladyboys dressed up in "Madame Butterfly" type of costumes who did a slow graceful balletic dance. Enormous illuminated paper sculptures showing (presumably) scenes from their religious stories were carried along by groups of men, each towing a little generator to power the glittering lights! A green dragon about 5 metres long and 5 metres high led the way at the front, glowing with light from inside.

Three of these intricate shining structures had a teenage Thai girl sitting proudly in front, smiling, with PERFECT makeup and PERFECT traditional dress, smooth glowing embroidered silks, white cotton, gold threads everywhere. The girls were heartbreakingly BEAUTIFUL, and had obviously spent hours and hours preparing for the parades. Hugh says he thought they were the three most gorgeous women in the world :)

We followed the parade down to the river, and what met us there was the most crazy, abandoned joyful celebration I have ever seen. The air resounded with the non-stop sound of fireworks, earth-shaking mortars, screaming rockets, firecrackers, Catherine wheels, immense exploding starbursts, all being let off by the thousands of people teeming through the streets and lining the banks of the river. The noise and chaos was constant, from the time we arrived until the time we left about 4 hours later. We bought firecrackers from street sellers and threw them at each other BANG! CRACK! BANG! we were jumping all over the place, we sent rockets screaming off. It would never be allowed in the UK - it would end in carnage and burns for a start! I think we don't have the same kind of respect for each other that the Thais have, we didn't see any injuries and no "attitude" at all.

All day I had noticed around town girls making ornate round "cake-looking" things, rimmed with trimmed banana leaves and decorated with flowers, candles and incense sticks. These are the "krathongs", and down by the riverside they are lit and sent out, so the river was a Milky Way of tiny bobbing lights, glowing incense sticks. We all bought one, floated them out into the river and made a wish. Mine was decorated with red roses, and I wished that we would stay together FOREVER (ahhh kissy kisssssy smooooooooch barf barf) and that one day we would come back to Chiang Mai and you could see Loy Krathong for yourself.

The sky was full of paper lanterns about a metre tall, held aloft by the hot air from some burning contraption beneath them. They flickered with the orange glow of the flames, and floated higher and higher until they disappeared from view. We found out that they less than a pound each, so myself and Pablo bought one, and with the expert help of young Thai children running the stall, lit them and sent them off into the stratosphere! Just before they let go, the boy lit a string of fireworks which hangs beneath the lantern and when it reached about 100 feet up they went off, shooting flames and sparks down towards the ground.

When I was standing there watching my lantern join those of the celebration, I felt like it was one of the best things I had ever done, and shivers went down my spine! It all seemed very spiritual to me, perhaps I need to become a Pagan-Buddhist-Druid-but-still-with-Catholic-guilt :)

We walked around for ages just taking it all in, it was totally entrancing. After beer in the midst of the cacophony we took a songthaew (Thai taxi a bit like a little cattle truck) back to Thapae Gate, near our guesthouse, just in time to see the end of a beauty contest on a floodlit stage in the middle of the square. No swimsuits here though - these (river) goddesses were, again, all dressed in traditional Thai dress which looked even more radiant in the glare of the floodlights. A rainbow of different silks and smiles!

I have to go now, but there's so much more to tell you - I haven't MENTIONED our trek, or the crazy train party we just had on the night train into Bangkok. If there's time I'll send a bit more tomorrow, but otherwise I will see you in about 30 hours. You'd better get a bottle of wine in - I won't be able to sleep without a drink, it will be "cold turkey" after the last two weeks!

Priddy sounds cool, I hope me and you can do a couple of trips like that this winter. Provided that you haven't offended the locals, that is.

See you soon, probably about 1am Sunday morning. Your turn to go and get the breakfast :)

JP xxxx