7 Inspiring And Refreshing Water Festivals Around The World
SHARE
@evabyxy
While many people avoid traveling during the rainy season, there are festivals around the world that celebrate water and even the beginning of monsoon season. These seven festivals across the globe are inspiring traditions that use water to symbolize the refreshing of your life.
1. Songkran
Perhaps the most famous water festival, Thailand’s New Year celebrations in Chiang Mai are epic. What’s now evolved into massive water fights in the streets began with the tradition of sprinkling water to purge the old and begin again in the new year. But now, you can expect to be soaked by water gun fights or legit buckets of water dumped on your head.
2. Thingyan
In Myanmar, the Buddhist New Year is celebrated in a similar fashion to neighboring Thailand’s Songkran. There are water-soaked dance floors, traditional offerings made for cleansing rituals and giant water fights in the streets. You can also sample mont lone yeibaw, a sweet rice ball dish commonly made for the holiday.
3. Dai Water Splashing Festival
In the Southeast of China, you’ll find Jinghong. It’s not far from the border with Myanmar, so it makes sense there’s a New Year festival here as well that utilizes water for the celebrations. The first two days of the festival are more subdued and traditional, while the third day of the festival is basically a free-for-all water fight.
4. Chaul Chnam Thmey
Like neighboring countries, Cambodia’s New Year comes with buckets of water dousing you with luck for the new year. But there are also traditional dances, games and foods like the kralan, a steamed rice cake made with peas and coconut that’s then roasted inside bamboo.
5. Vardavar
Armenia’s water festival is a mixture of pagan and Christian traditions dating back to a harvest-time celebration of fertility. Now, it’s an opportunity to drench your friends and family members in water. The colorful origins of the holiday remain. Vardavar was named for a legend of a goddess pouring water from roses, so you may see bouquets of flowers next to the all-out water fights.
6. Aadi Perukku
Held before South India’s monsoon season, the Aadi Perukku festival focuses on the life-giving properties of water. Many people celebrate by visiting waterfalls, lakes or riverbeds and sometimes leave offerings of prayers, fruits, beads and other small items to acknowledge the water systems that support the cultures around them.
7. Boryeong Mud Festival
This isn’t water, per se, but you need water to make mud, so we’re calling Boryeong fair game. The South Korean festival known as Mudfest includes activities like mud swimming, mud sliding and mud wrestling. The festival originally started as a way to promote the mineral-rich mud of the Boryeong region, and now, the event brings in tons of mud fans every year.
RELATED
These 6 Floating Markets Around The World Are A Shopper’s Dream
8 Of The Coolest Night Markets In The World For Evening Shopping Bliss
Next on
