"Reflections" A Collection of Writing by students in Bray and Wicklow Collection 1 | Page 10

SONGKRAN
[New Year in Thailand]
Songkran is New Year in Thailand
and it’s the most famous festival.
It is on the 13 th to the 15 th of April
although in the holiday resorts it
goes on for two or three days
longer. It’s a water festival but as
the average temperatures go as
high as 32C you don’t mind getting
wet.
Thailand is a Buddhist country and
their calendar is different than
ours. Their calendar is around 543
years ahead of ours. Their year now
is 2561B.E. while ours is 2018A.D.
It’s one of the most important
times of the year in Thailand and
everyone goes home to be with their family. A couple of days before the
13 th all the houses are cleaned as it is a new beginning for everything.
People will travel from one end of Thailand, say Phuket to Chiang Mai
which is about 14 hours by car or 2 hours flying. The roads are jammed
from the 11 th and there are lots of accidents. We were lucky that we
booked a flight two months beforehand.
On the morning of the 13 th everyone goes to the temple to give the
monks some food and to pay respects to parents and elders by washing
their feet and hands. When we get home for our breakfast everybody is
sitting around making plans.