Celebration

THE SONGKRAN SPLASH!

To celebrate the beginning of a New Year and make spring-cleaning fun, let’s have a water festival! This is what people do in Thailand when they celebrate the Songkran Festival. This festival marks the beginning of the Thai New Year and is usually celebrated from April 12 to 16. Songkran is all about making a fresh start. It has been a long-standing custom to splash water on family members and friends, and this tradition has now turned into the biggest water festival in the world! Why, you ask? Splashing water is a symbol of washing away the previous year and welcoming the new year, with a clean slate. It signifies cleansing. If you step out during the Songkran days, you will be sure to get attacked with water! Events are held all over Thailand to celebrate Songkran - including parades, exhibitions, dances, boat races and traditional beauty pageants- like the Miss Songkran Contest. Families get together, do their spring cleaning, visit temples, and splash water at each other. In 194O, January 1 was fixed as the official New Year and Songkran turned into a national holiday and important summer festival.

Custom: habitual practice Splashing: to scatter liquid

The word ‘Songkran’ comes from the Sanskrit word ‘Sankranti’ which means ‘movement of the sun.’