Lao
Festivals & Events.
Laos
cerebrates many annual festivals called “Boun” which are particularly
enjoyable
and beautiful, signifying traditional aspects of Lao lifestyle. Most
festivals
are connected with religion and the yearly rice farming cycle. The
timing of
the festivals is calculating according to the Buddhist lunar calendar. |
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03-04
February
Boun
Khoun Khao
or Khoun
Lan (Rice Ceremony)
It is a harvest festival
held at Songkhon District in Savannakhet Province.
“Basi” ceremony is performed in order to give thanks to the
land. |
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15-16 Februry
Boun Khao Chi
The ceremony is
held at
the “Wat” (temple) in the morning, when a
special “bread
made of sticky rice” is offered. This festival is held during the third
full
moon of the lunar calendar. |
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| At the same period,
similar festivals are celebrated
in many provinces |
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Sikhottabong
festival in Khammouane
Province
Thai traditional religiois festival is held at Sikhottabang Stupa,
located about
8 kilometers to the south of Thakhek town. The stupa was built between
the 9th and 10thCentury by King Nantahsena
and was restored to its
original grandeur during the 1950's. |
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Wat Phou
Festival in Champasack
Province
This festival is held
during the third full moon of the lunar calendar
on the grounds of enhancing pre-Angorian Wat Phu ruins in Champasack.
Festivities include elephant races, buffalo fights, cock fighting,
traditional
Lao music and dance performances. To coincide with the festival, a
trade fair
is also held to showcase products originating from southern Laos, Thailand,
Cambodia
and Vietnam.
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Wat Phou
Festival in Champasack
Province
This festival is held
during the third full moon of the lunar calendar
on the grounds of enhancing pre-Angorian Wat Phu ruins in Champasack.
Festivities include elephant races, buffalo fights, cock fighting,
traditional
Lao music and dance performances. To coincide with the festival, a
trade fair
is also held to showcase products originating from southern Laos, Thailand,
Cambodia
and Vietnam.
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Boun
Pha Vet
An offering ceremony where a donation is made and one’s future is read
during
the three day-three night festivals. |
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14-15-16
April
"Boun Pi Mai" Lao’s New Year
Lao'sNew Year is celebrated at the same time each year (April
13-15).
This year, the 16th in the first day of the New Year. On the
13th,
Buddha images are taken out of the temples to be cleansed with scented
water by
devotees, and placed on special temporary alters within the compounds
of “Wats”
(temples). Devotees gather the scented water falling off the images, to
take
home and use it to pour on friends and relatives, as an act of
cleansing and
purification before entering the New Year. On the evening of the 15th,
the images are returned to their proper shiners within the temples.
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| Boun Pimai is a time for
much joyous celebration, with good deeds and
prayers in anticipation the New Year. |
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Boun Bang
Fai (Rocket festival)
A ceremony praying for rain is performed at the temple in the morning.
In the
afternoon, people gather in fields on the outskirts of villages and
towns to
launch the rockets with much abandoned revelry. Villages, communities
and
department compete for the “best decorated” and the “highest traveling”
rocket.
Beginning around the middle May, the festivals are staggered from place
to
place enable more participation and attendance. This is the time when
an
offering to the spirits can be made in a comer of one’s garden, early
each
morning. |
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15 May
Boun Visakhaboucha
This festival is held during the sixth full moon of the lunar calendar
for the
Buddha. Candlelight processions are held in temples to mark the birth
date of
Buddha. |
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13-14 July
Boun
Asalahaboucha and Boun Kho Pansa (Buddhist
Lent)
It is the beginning of Buddhist Lent. During the next three-month
period, monks
spend most of their times in prayer and meditation and the restricted
from
spending nights in other of the lunar calendar. |
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25-26 August
“Boun Khao Padabdin (Rice) and Boat Racing Festival at Luang Prabang.
At the Khao Padabdin
ceremony day, people visit local temples to make
offerings
to dead ancestors as well as to share merits making. This festival
includes
boat racing on the Nam Khan River
and a trade fair in Luang
Prabang
World
Heritage
Town.
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10 September
Boun Khao Salak (Rice)
It is for offering to be
made for dead ancestors to obtain merit.
Popular and
exciting longboat-racing competitions are held to celebrate the River.
Ths
festival is held during the tenth full moon of the lunar calendar.
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