Little Thailand, a home away from home during Thai New Year
If there is a festival or party where the entire country of Thailand paralyses, it has to be the Songkran festival or the Thai New Year. Considered one of Thailand’s wildest festival, the Songkran festival is also celebrated in other parts of the world where the Thai diaspora has led people. The Thai community is the 7th largest ethnic minority in Hong Kong according to the latest Hong Kong census in 2016, with a population of 10,215; most of which live in “Little Thailand”, a point of rich cultural cohesion and diversity at the same time, and a home away from home for many Thais.
Kowloon City, home to what the locals call Little Thailand, it acquired the name for the large number of shops and restaurants run by Thais, many of who are a result of the influx of Thai migrants in the 1980s and 1990s. Many Thais live and own restaurants and stores in Kowloon City.It is almost as if it was a self-sustainable community, there are Thai beauty salons, massage parlours, authentic Thai restaurants and shops selling native spices and snacks, hence there is no lack of enthusiasm for the celebration of the wildest Thai festival: Songkran.
As early as 9am you can see kids and adults gathering water, whose purpose is to make streets transform into a celebratory water war. Although native to Thailand, the festival attracts many people from the Thai community in Hong Kong as well as travellers from Thailand itself, so the local Thai community, Hong Kong locals and foreigners get together to declare a water war on each other and anyone that crosses their path. Families sit along the streets with gigantic water buckets, the perfect ammunition for their weapons consisting of water hoses, smaller buckets, and the most popular weapon: plastic water guns.
Sudarat, 53 and her husband Krit, 58 own a small shop right in front of the main street where the water celebration occurs. “We always look forward to this time of the year”, says Sudara. She and her husband not only are present at their shop but they also provide free water buckets from their shop for people to reload their water guns. Sudarat’s husband Krit happily explains that although his main concern is not money on Thai new year, it is a great start for his business in the Thai new year, “we always have more people come in our shop this time of the year, Thai people want to buy more food, snacks, drinks and everything from Thailand in our shop”.
The throwing and splashing of water marks the end of the dry season as April is Thailand’s hottest month. Contrary to many believing that Songkran is solely the equivalent to the water festival, the Thai Programme director at the University of Hong Kong, Ms. Kanokwal Ratana-u-bol, or Took as she preferred to be called, explains how there is a misunderstanding that this is just the water festival, “this is actually also the Thai New Year”, says Took. The splashing of water and soap is meant to signify the cleansing of the body which brings luck and prosperity. Took has been teaching Thai at the University of Hong Kong since 2001, “I come here to this festival every year since I’ve been in Hong Kong”, she says. “The Thai community in Hong Kong is very united and this festival represents our unity”, she adds.
With water being sloshed about under everyone’s feet and thrown overhead anywhere you go, there is no escape from getting wet, or getting soap on your face, if you’re lucky though, you might be able to escape the bombs of flour and splashing of soap indiscriminately thrown around. The only escape is perhaps wearing a plastic raincoat
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