Loy Kratong

November 12 is Loy Kratong in Thailand. This festival is always on the night of the full moon of the 12th lunar month. In this festival, which is held all over Thailand, people make or buy small floating rafts, each of which has some flowers and a candle. Usually there are also three joss sticks (incense), and the person adds a small coin.

The candle and incense are lit and the kratong is placed in the water. The person makes a silent prayer for good things to happen. As the kratong floats away, it takes away the person's troubles and other bad things.

The Thai word "loy" means "to float" and "kratong" means "banana-leaf tray". In 2002, the then mayor of Bangkok told everyone to use styrofoam, as it is light, cheap, and easy to spot in the rivers, and thus easy to clean up. However, this caused an uproar from the environmentalists, and today most kratongs are made from banana leaves or from a special, hardened bread, which dissolves.

At the festival that I attended a few years ago, on the bank of the Chao Praya, small boys stood in the water about 2 or 3 meters off shore and gently pushed the kratongs out further into the river, while discreetly stealing any coins on the kratong.

It's a beautiful sight to see all these floating candle-lit kratongs on the river.

Downstream a little from where people were launching their kratongs, a power boat manned by city employees was fishing the kratongs out of the water after the candle had burned out. Presumably this was the environmental clean-up crew.

What disturbed me, though, was all the plastic bags scattered around the launching area. There are vendors on the street selling ready-made kratongs for a few baht; they put the kratong in a small plastic bag. The person carries the bag to the launching area on the river, removes the kratong from the bag, and throws the bag away. Arrrrgh! Bags everywhere. And the strange thing is, there was a large rubbish bin right there. I picked up a few bags myself and put them in the bin, but there were hundreds more.

No common sense.

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