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A variety of festivals and religious
ceremonies are observed throughout the
whole year. The most important ones are
listed below.
Mid January:
Boun Khoun Khao : Harvest festival in
villages. A ceremony is performed giving
thanks to the spirit of the land.
February:
Boun Khao Chi : a ceremony held at
the vat in the morning, when a special
"bread made of sticky rice" is offered.
March:
Boun Pha Vet : a ceremony of offering
donations to have one's future read from
a piece of paper drawn, during the three
day-three night festival.
April:
 Boun Pimai : the Lao New Year, is
celebrated in mid April. On the first
day of the festival, Buddha images are
taken out of the temples to be cleaned
with scented water. The water which
drops from the images is collected and
taken home in order to pour it on
friends and relatives as an act of
cleaning and purification. On the
evening of the final day, the Buddha
images are returned to their proper
shrines. In Luang Prabang the festival
also features a beauty contest with the
crowning of Miss Pimai.
Mid May:
Boun Bangfai : the rocket festival,
is held at the beginning of the rainy
season. The festival is a call for rain
and a celebration of fertility. In the
morning a religious ceremony is
performed. In the afternoon, people
gather in the fields on the outskirts of
villages and towns to launch self-made
firework rockets. Different communities
compete for the best decorated and the
highest travelling rocket. Men disguised
as women perform vaudeville acts using
wooden phalli in order to anger the
gods. As revenge, the gods are expected
to send thunderstorms. Beginning around
the middle of May, the rocket festivals
are staggered from place to place to
enable greater participation and
attendance.
June:
This is time when an offering to the
spirits can be made in a corner of one's
garden, very early in the morning.
July:
Boun Khao Phansa : the beginning of
the Buddhist lent. During the next
three-month period. Monks spend most of
their time in prayer and meditation and
are restricted from spending nights in
other vats other than their own.
August:
Boun Kao Padabdinh : the observation
of a practice of making offerings to the
dead.
September:
Boun Ok Phansa : that marks the end
of the monks' three-month-fast and
retreat during the rainy season. At
dawn, donations and offerings are made
at the temples. Prayers are chanted by
the monks, and at dusk candlelight
processions wind round the temples.
Concurrently, hundreds of decorated
candlelit-floats, made of paper, are set
adrift in the rivers. These carry
offerings and incense, transforming the
river into a fragrant snake of
sparkling. This ceremonial part is
called Boun Lay Heua fai. The biggest
event of the Phansa festival, Boun
Souang Heua, is a boat race on the
Mekong river between competing
communities the next day.
November:
Boun That Luang : is a three-day
religious festival celebrated at full
moon in November. It begins with
pre-dawn gathering of ten thousands of
pilgrims from Laos and Thailand at That
Luang who listen to prayers and sermons
chanted by hundreds of monks
representing all Lao vats. During the
following days a fair is held nearby.
The festival ends with a huge fireworks
display.
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