I have changed my blogging engine.

At least temporarily, I am not blogging here, but am blogging now at:

http://www.all-my-world.com/pmwiki/pmwi ... yWorldBlog

Why?

I am experimenting with moving all my web-pages into a wiki environment.

If the technology turns out to be unstable, feature-deficient, or otherwise unsuitable, then I might revert.

Please check out my new Blog.

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Loi krathong is one of the important festivals for Thais. It is held each year in November, at the time of the full moon. There are many, differing, stories about the meaning/purpose/tradition of loi krathong, but my understanding of it is something like this:

Once each year, folks believe, there is value in taking stock of their situation, letting go of things they are dragging around like heavy weights in their heart, setting up a new batch of wishes and aspirations and making a fresh start. loi krathong festival is the time when almost everyone in Thailand performs this ritual.

loi krathong means something like floating a raft, and the krathong is the symbolic raft that carries away the bad stuff and simultaneously carries forward the new hopes of the individual.

On the night of loi krathong almost every river, klong, dam, pond, puddle or swimming pool in Bangkok is dragged into service as the water upon which the raft will be floated. Stalls are set up beside the water and krathong are offered for sale. Small krathong can be purchased for as little as 20baht, while more elaborate krathong cost several hundred baht. Often there are also food stalls, and frequently there is a party organised, complete with very loud PA systems, traditional dancers and pop song performers.

Our apartment complex goes all the way; one swimming pool and its environs is festooned with decorations and coloured fairy lights; a stage is set up for dancers and singers; food stalls are brought in from the lane; a small "fun park" is erected for the entertainment of the kids, complete with shooting galleries and other fun stuff. Tickets are sold for the event, and food, entertainment and krathong are included in the entry price.

Na, however, believes much of the fun and significance of loi krathong is in the making of the floats, so on the day of the festival our apartment could easily be mistaken for a florist business. She makes an early start for the Bangkok Flower market, taking Na'Dom...our housekeeper,cook, nanny...for an extra pair of hands when it comes to lugging the increasing load about the crowded market. After an absence of 2-3hours they arrive home, wheeling a heaped supermarket trolley of flowers, stems and assorted hardware for holding the creations together.

Without even pausing to eat lunch, Na spreads the purchases out all over the living room floor, and they are immediately into the creation of their masterpieces. Calculating that they have enough material for about 20 krathong I ask, as casually as possible,

"So...how many krathong are you making this year?"

"Five" is the immediate response.

"I guess one of them is going to be big, then?"

"One will be VERY big."

I am familiar with two kinds of flotation base for krathong ...the tradition slab [cross-section] from the trunk of a banana palm which is very pithy and quite buoyant, and the modern polystyrene, environmentally unfriendly alternative. Now Na'Dom is hacking a large pile of giant leaf stalks into a huge pile of 15cm lengths...after watching for a while, it dawns on me that perhaps this is a traditional alternative raft that I have not seen before...

"Wait and see" says Na, when I ask the question.

Sure enough, a couple of hundred lengths are tied together into a tight bundle, and it is clear this is to be the base for the very big krathong.A slab of banana palm would never have been big enough. I can see it is heavy, though, so ask "Are you sure this thing will float?"

...a big base

Doubt fills Na's face. She half-fills the bath-tub, then staggers in with her raft; it barely fits in the tub, but floats with surprising ease...must be a lot of air trapped in these stalks.

Now "daughter" Yaow has wakened; she comes into the living room and immediately starts on her creation, a more modest thing that will float on a slab of banana palm.

There are several bags of flowers. Na is working on the Lotus buds; removing nearly all the stalk, she peels off the tough outer layers of the bud to reveal the softer and delicately pink coloured petals; carefully, she folds 5 or 6 of these petals in a way that suggests the bud is both a bud and an opened bloom; she drops the results in to a basin of water, and in about 30 minutes I estimate the basin contains about 80 of these creations.

I check another bag, and am surprised to see it is full of individual orchid blooms of the wildest hues; close inspection convinces me these flowers have been sprayed with some kind of paint to dramatically enhance their colours.

There is another bag of brilliant gold marigold heads, and another full of bright purple blooms that look like miniature pom-poms.

There is a very large bundle of fresh banana palm leaves; now it becomes the centre of activity as the rafts are ready for decorations to begin; the three ladies are all tearing the banana leaves into sections, which are then rolled up to make tubes or cones and these are then bundled and fixed to the rafts with flat-head steel nails of various lengths.

Time passes. Yaow complains of sore hands, so she is sent out into the lane to buy food. When she returns, a small space in the "work-room" is cleared and everyone stops their activities for just long enough to consume the rice and condiments.

Work resumes. I take the Boy downstairs so he can play and off-load a little pent-up energy. While he dashes about, I prowl about the garden with camera trying to do something creative with bees and other bugs. After about 2 hours I judge that it might be safe to return to the apartment; we return to discover that finishing touches are in progress.

There is a mound of refuse in the centre of the living-room floor, and there are 5 very ornate and professional-looking krathong on the table. Na'Dom cleans up the place, quickly, while I shower the Boy and then help him dress in the traditional costume for the occasion. Soon we are all ready to go...a good thing as it is now dark outside, and the free food will be taking heavy punishment.

There is time for a couple of quick photo-opportunities, then Na'Dom departs with her krathong [she says she might visit the "golden mountain" area of Bangkok where there is a huge event every loi krathong], and Nong Yaow leaves with her krathong [says she and a couple of school friends are intending to release their krathong into the river nearby].

Na, the Boy, and I head downstairs, and are greeted with great acclaim when folks see the beautiful krathong I am staggering along under...it is easily the most grand of all creations in the swimming pool this year!



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I have begun to understand the importance of string in the rituals of up-country Thais.

Many stores and stalls have large balls of white cotton string available for sale. It has crossed my mind that I should buy a ball of it just in case I get an uncontrollable urge to build a kite and fly it [when I was a young kid, I spent many, many hours building kites from brown paper and thin slivers of wood split from weathered and rotting fence palings, and I was constantly searching for pieces of thin string that I could tie together to make the long strings I required for my upper-stratosphere flights].

I have already witnessed a number of smallish string tie-ups:

* At traditional Thai wedding ceremonies, a ball of this string is wound around the heads of the bride and groom, through the hands of officiating monks, sometimes through the hands of all the family members and guests, and tied off at the always-present bronze Buddha icon.

* At many ceremonies involving monks, the string ties together the participants, celebrants and monks, and is tied off at the bronze Buddha icon.

But one needs only a small ball of string for these occasions.

This weekend we are up-country in Surin Province in Isaan. It is a special weekend for celebrating family, friends and community ties. It has been raining heavily, and the village is experiencing minor flooding. Now the rain has eased of a little. I am standing under the verandah and taking pictures of water drops on leaves.

Two very wet youths come into view, moving slowly along the muddy lane. One has a huge spool of white string, which he is slowly unravelling. The other has a 2 metre length of bamboo, which he is using to lift the string into the branches of trees along the lane.

...raining

Later, I point out the string to Na, and ask her what it is for.

"We put string around all of the village, and tomorrow morning you will see many people at the wat [temple] for big day for family and everyone."

There is a brief cessation of rain, so I take the opportunity to go for a walk around the village. Sure enough. this string completely surrounds the main part of the village, including the temple, the school and most of the villagers' homes. I estimate there needs to be about 2.5km of string to make this loop. There are also single string off-shoots...branches that connect to the main loop and disappear into homes along the way.

...string everywhere

In the morning, we go to the temple early...perhaps 7:30am. There are several large marquees erected around the main building, and the ground under them is quite wet from the rain. we leave our shoes at the bottom of the steps and go into the main building.

Polygrass mats have been spread out all over the wooden floor, and already there are quite a few family groups sitting together on the floor and chatting quietly. Small kids are playing little hide&seek games among the family groups. The powerful PA system is pumping out popular Isaan songs. We select a spot on the floor, and sit. Within minutes we are surrounded by other family groups who have come in just after us.

Inquisitive little kids are sneaking up for a closer look at me...the only farang [foreigner] in the place. Old school mates of Na's...some she has not seen for many years...come up to say sawasdee kaa [Hi] to her, and also to size up her farang .

Now there are at least 500 folks in the building...the temple serves several close-by villages in addition to ours. Now the family groups gather up their small bowls of steamed rice, and form a queue...the front of the queue are in action, moving along the row of monks' alms bowls and placing a spoon of rice in each as they move along. The queue is moving slowly, and I can see it will take a long time for the whole crowd to perform this monk-feeding ritual

...at least 500

It is time! The music is stopped, and this signals the start of the ritual. 8 monks make their way to the slightly raised platform at one end of the hall, and squat in a row facing their audience, but just behind their, now heaped, alms bowls. I see the white string, that enters the main hall from one side, crosses the place where the monks sit so that they can take it up in their hands, passes to the right of the head monk to where it is finally fixed to the bronze Buddha icon.

Now the Head Man of the tambon [name for a collection of small villages] takes up a microphone and, after coughing into it, then tapping it several times, begins a short chant directed at the monks. The crowd chime in occasionally with their set responses.

Now the head monk takes up a microphone; he spits out his wad of betel into a waiting spitoon, clears his throat and begins what will certainly be a long series of Pali chants; the other 7 monks join him, and they create a remarkably melodious sound in the huge auditorium; occasionally, there is a part for the crowd, and they give their set responses...

bud dham sara nam gac cha mi
dam man sara nam gac cha mi
sang ham sara nam gac cha mi...
[The three refuges]

Once, I asked Na what was the meaning of this opening stanza.

"I don't know."

"Is it in Thai, or Khmer?"

"No...not Thai...not Khmer."

"What language?"

"Don't know...but Thai always say this thing when monks come."

The string, then, represents a connecting...in this case, a connecting together of all the families of the Village into a single "extended family", and connected finally to Buddha through the temple and the monks of the Village. It's a powerful symbol, and probably tells foreigners like me something about the very different family and community "ties" of up-country Thai people.



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