Rocket Festival
Local participants and sponsors take advantage of the occasion to enhance their social prestige, as is customary at traditional Buddhist folk festivals throughout Southeast Asia.
[1] Bun Bang Fai is celebrated in all provinces across Laos, but the most popular one used to be held along the bank of the Mekong river in the capital, Vientiane.
However, because of considerable urbanization and safety measures, the festivals are now celebrated in nearby villages, including Naxon, Natham, Thongmang, Ban Kern, and Pakkagnoung.
The festival in Thailand also includes special programs and specific local patterns like Bang Fai (parade dance) and a Beautiful Bang Fai float such as Yasothon on the third weekend of May, and continues to Suwannaphum District, Roi Et, on the first weekend of June, and Phanom Phrai District during the full moon of the seventh month in the Lunar year's calendar each year.
These Buddhist festivals are presumed to have evolved from pre-Buddhist fertility rites held to celebrate and encourage the coming of the rains, from before the 9th century invention of black powder.
Louis de Carné, in 1866, described a celebration in southern Laos where bamboos loaded with powder went off, producing violent explosions.
[5] Giving the "Bun Bang Fai or fire rocket festival of Laos", as one example, he adds that it remains "far more elaborate in the villages than in the cities".
Bun Bang Fai is held over the sixth Lunar month, usually around May and June, coinciding with the plantation and the beginning of the rainy seasons.
Early in the afternoon, a Buddhist procession starts in which villagers carrying money trees[6] circle the central ordination hall, in which there is a Buddha statue, three times in a clockwise rotation on the sound of traditional music (Lao: ພິທີແຫ່ຕົ້ນເງິນ, romanized: Phi Thee Hae Ton Ngoen).
Afterwards, rockets from all involved villages are displayed in the court of the temple, followed by a celebration with traditional music and dance that can last up to the early morning of the next day.
The second day begins with a morning ceremony of food offerings from villagers to the monks in the assembly hall of the temple (Lao: ພິທີຕັກບາດ, romanized: Phi Thee Tak Baat).
The food usually includes sticky rice, cakes, and other sweets that the faithful line up to place in the monks’ almsbowls during the sermon.
The religious ceremony is followed by a street parade through the village with pickup trucks displaying the rockets on the sound of the Khene (Lao: ແຄນ), cymbals, and long drums.
The deputy abbot of Wat Lao Buddhavong in Virginia acknowledged that "this event is historic and brings recognition and visibility that all Laotians can be proud of".
In recent years, the Tourism Authority of Thailand has promoted the events, particularly in the Thai provinces of Nong Khai and Yasothon.
The Bun bang Fai celebration in the past were in Yasothorn, Roi Et, Kalasin, Srisaket, Mahasarakham, and Udon Thani.
The time it takes for the exhaust to burn through the vines (usually) allows a motor to build up to full thrust; then the tails impart in-flight stability.
Phadaeng flees the flood with Nang Ai on his white stallion, Bak Sam, but she is swept off by Naga's tail, not to be seen again.
"[17] The original was written in a Lao-Isan verse called Khong saan; it has sexual innuendo, puns, and double entendre.
Keyes[18] on page 48 wrote that "Phra Daeng Nang Ai" is a version of Kaundinya, the legendary founder of Funan, and Soma, the daughter of the king of the Nāga.
However, a reading of the underlying myth, as presented in Yasothon and Nong Khai, implies the opposite: the rains bring on the rockets.
Previous attempts at aerial warfare against Phaya Thaen in his own element had proved futile; but even the Sky must come down to the ground.
After the harvest of the resulting crops, Wow thanoo, man-sized kites with a strung bow, are staked out in winter monsoon winds.
All participants (including a wow thanoo) were depicted on murals on the front of the former Yasothon Municipal Bang Fai Museum, but were removed when it was remodeled as a learning center.
Set in 1890s Siam, the movie's hero, Jone Bang Fai ("Fireball Bandit"), is an expert at building the traditional bamboo rockets, which he uses in conjunction with Muay Thai martial arts to defeat his opponents.
Thai political protests in April 2010 similarly had Red Shirts firing bang fai in downtown Bangkok.
In the film, a young boy named Ahlo wanted to enter the rocket-making contest, hoping to win a big cash prize and prove that he was not cursed.
