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There are hundreds of festivals that take place all over Thailand. Some
are famous and are often promoted. However, there are quite a few that
are only known to local people. Maybe this is for a good reason, but
some of them are real gems which are really worth going to. Personally
I find many of these small festivals worthwhile. Today I went to
another one which you won't find in any guidebook nor the websites of
the Tourist Authority of Thailand. This was the "Luang Phor Pan
Revering Ritual" in Bang Bo District in Samut Prakan. I had no idea
what to expect but it turned out to be one of the best festivals I have
been to in Thailand for a long time. I will definitely go again next
year as I had a really enjoyable time. Everyone was so kind to me and
made me feel at home. I love these festivals, that despite there being
thousands of people, I am the only foreigner there.
Luang Phor Pan was a revered monk at Wat Mongkol Kothawas in Klong
Dan Sub-District during the reign of King Rama V. He was famous for his
meditation techniques. Although he died over 60 years ago, he is still
worshipped by the local people. I drove over to Klong Dan early this
morning. When I arrived, the monks were just finishing their chanting
and there were hundreds of people in the main hall paying respect to
the image of the monk. At exactly 7.09 a.m., the image was carefully
lifted by a team of men and carried out to the nearby canal where it
was then placed into a large boat. This reminded me of the "Rub Bua"
festival in Bang Phli where a Buddha image is put on a boat so that the
local people can line the banks to worship the image. However, this was
slightly different. For a start, this was the real image. Secondly,
there weren’t many people lining the banks. This is because everyone
piled into dozens of different sized boats in order to take part in a
water parade.
There were about seven boats that left the temple. Most of them were
large open decked boats with no seating. I guess there were about 500
people on these boats. However, as we made progress down the canal, we
were joined by dozens of more boats of various sizes. Along the way
there were also people on the banks waving to us. We passed a fleet of
fishing boats that were moored and off-loading their fish. A few of
them also joined us for this merit-making water parade. By the time we
reached the open sea twenty minutes later there was quite a large
flotilla of boats. It was really an amazing sight and a wonderful
atmosphere that is difficult to capture in still images. When I go next
year I will shoot some video to share with you.
We went about three kilometres or so off-shore to a point where we
started to do a large "wien-tien" around an imaginary point. Normally,
these are candlelight processions around the main temple building three
times in a clockwise direction. Here we went around in large circles
three times following the boat carrying the image of Luang Phor Pan.
Whilst this was going on, monks on that boat were chanting and
consecrating sacred water which would be used later to bless the local
people. We seemed to be going around in circles forever. I tried to
count the boats taking part but I lost count after sixty. About forty
minutes later we had finished going around in circles. At a temple it
would have only taken 10 minutes. Then there was a mad scramble for
each boat to get a small flag with an image of the monk and sacred
writings. These were being handed out by the boat with the monk's
image. They used a long pole but still it was chaos as everyone wanted
to get a flag for their boat. Luckily, even though we hit a few boats,
there were no serious incidents and we soon headed back to shore.
We finally arrived back at the temple nearly two hours after the
start of the festival. I thought that was the end of the festival. I
took some pictures of them off-loading Luang Phor Pan from the boat. I
thought that they would take it back to the temple. However, they next
loaded the image onto a decorated truck. The monks climbed up with it
and then it set off for the next parade. This time, on land around the
city. However, the way ahead was blocked by literally hundreds of
motorcycles. I walked back up towards the main road to see what was
going on. There I discovered that there was a bottleneck where all the
motorcyclists were waiting to receive little red or yellow flags much
the same that was given to the boat captains. I guess this was a kind
of reward for taking part in the parade as they were handing them out
to all the drivers. Unlike other parades I had taken photos of in the
past, this one didn’t have floats. The truck carrying Luang Phor Pan
was being escorted by hundreds of motorcycles and cars.
I waited near Klong Dan Market as the parade approached. The monks
on the back of the truck were chanting and two monks on either side
were sprinkling the local people with the sacred water that they had
prepared earlier. Hundreds of people were lining each side of the
narrow road to receive the blessing from the monks. I noticed they also
gave offerings by throwing up bags of food and sweetmeats. Everyone was
in a joyful mood and several people kept offering me food which I
thought strange at first. I just put it down to the local people being
so friendly to strangers. However, I soon realized that this was a
major part of the parade. The pickup trucks and cars following on
behind were handing out food and drinks to everyone who had just been
blessed by the monks. Some people reached out their hands while others
had baskets. People were handing out food cartons, ice cream, Thai
desserts and drinks. It was really amazing the scale of generosity of
the local people taking part in the parade.
Once the parade reached the old Suikhumwit Road, which runs through
Klong Dan, it turned left and headed towards the border with
Chachoengsao Province. I wasn't sure where it was going next, but I
decided to walk back to my car near the temple so that I could try and
follow it. As I walked back, I was given plenty of food and drinks
which was really great as I was getting a bit hungry by this time. It
took about fifteen minutes to walk back and I thought that when I got
there I would reach the end of the parade. But, the cars and pickups
stretched much further as far as the eye could see. This turned out to
be the longest parade I had ever seen. It was also the first parade I
had taken part in as I was now driving slowly behind all the other
cars. I even received my small flag to show that I had taken part!
I drove eastwards out of town to the border with the neighbouring
province. It took forever as there was such a traffic jam. Here the
parade did a u-turn and started heading back to Klong Dan. Lining the
road on both sides were people waiting with baskets ready to receive
food and drinks from people taking part in the parade. It remided me a
little of Songkran with people driving up and down in pickup trucks.
However, instead of throwing water at the local people, here they were
handing out goodies to them. This was such a great thing to witness and
to take part in. However, as the progress was so slow, I decided to
make a small detour to go and visit a tourist attraction which I will
tell you about another day. I then drove back to Klong Dan where I soon
realised that the parade was now going West out of the town. It turned
out that they wanted to to give all the local people a chance to take
part. What I didn't realize was that they were going to go all the way
to Samut Prakan city which was over 30 kms away! This last photo I took
at 1.35 p.m. along Taiban Road. It then did a u-turn and headed back to
Klong Dan. Closely followed by a posse of about 300 motorbikes.
That was such an awesome festival and very inspiring. I loved the boat
ride out into the Gulf of Thailand. And I loved the concept of giving
food and drinks out to the local people. I have never seen anything
like that before. You can see more of my pictures over at our site www.PaknamPhotos.com. If you are interested in taking part in this festival next year, keep an eye on our forums at www.ThailandQA.com where we post all the latest travel news and festival dates.
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