The biggest water fight in the world?

Trip Start Sep 18, 2006
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Trip End Mar 19, 2008


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Flag of Thailand  ,
Wednesday, April 11, 2007

This is a great time to be in Bangkok - Thai New Year taking place with a festival called Songkram from the 13th to the 15th. The traditional celebration was one of water blessing, of both Buddha statues and individuals, with sprinklings of water. I did go to the park near the palace to see this first hand as the festival organisers had put up a number of displays from around the country, as well as some impressive stage acts, but this is not where the action is.
The blessing has basically evolved into a HUGE water fight. Thousands of Thais, seemingly everyone under the age of 30, take over the streets for three days of partying and mayhem. The main activity is drenching one another; with water pistols, hoses, buckets, whatever comes to hand. Some people drive around in their pick-up trucks, passengers soaking pedestrians from vats of water in the back. They've also got this pastey flour mixture that they smear all over your face. After I walked around Banglamphu for a few hours getting soaked, I decided I had to fight back and bought a tasty water pistol. The rest of the festival I spent walking around squirting people and getting rather wet in return.
Its the sort of thing that would descend into outbreaks of violence in the UK, but which here everyone was simply in good spirits. The most anti-social behaviour I saw was the occasional person getting a bit over-excited with the flour smearing. They seemed to appreciate foreigners joining in too, and all seemed delighted with my pitifully small Thai vocabulary: 'Sab-a-dee be moi' (Happy New Year).
On the morning of the last day, Joel and Oz arrived for their holidays and were given a good introduction to Thailand. We stayed here for an extra day so they could see the palace, before flying down to the islands.
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