Like every Thai city during mid-April, Chiang Mai hosts two types of the water-splashing festival - the traditional and the modern.
Songkran, the 'water-throwing festival', is Thailand's most important celebration and takes place from April 13 to 15 each year. It marks the traditional Thai New Year and is at a time when temperatures hover around 40 degrees Celsius. The practice of splashing water helps to beat the heat but, as first-time participants quickly find out, there is splashing and then there is splashing.
The traditional way of celebrating New Year embodies everything that is endearing about Thai culture - respect and consideration for others, a flair for decoration and sanuk (a love of fun). The more modern method is a full-on, free-for-all water war, fought with buckets and toy weapons. Foreign visitors are much more likely to witness the latter.
Songkran is thought to have originated among the ethnic Tai people who migrated south from China into Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, and was originally a fertility rite to ensure adequate rain for a good harvest.
Each of the three days of the festival is associated with a different activity. The first, Wan Songkran Long, is the last day of the old year and begins with the letting off of firecrackers to chase away evil spirits. Houses are cleaned and scrubbed and Buddha images are symbolically bathed. In Chiang Mai, Buddha statues from the major temples are lined up for the Songkran Parade, which takes place in the afternoon and goes along Tha Pae and Ratchadamnoen roads to Wat Phra Singh. The parade is headed by the Phra Sihing, the city's most highly revered image, and the road is lined with people ready to bathe the statues with lustral water.
