Thingyan, The Burmese New Year Water Festival - Yangon Myanmar

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Thingyan is a Theravada Buddhist water festival celebrated in Myanmar around mid-April right before their traditional new year. In modern times, it's a playful water war that is waged on both the city and village streets across the country which happened to last five days this year.

Many people ride around in the back of trucks to get doused by hose-weilding people on temporary roadside spraying stages called pandals. They are literally like human car washes. No where and no one is dry. Which is ok, because April is the hottest, driest month of the year here. This week the temp was over 100ºF/38ºC every day. (A similar festival called Songkran is celebrated in Laos and Thailand around the same time.)

I met a couple guys in my hostel at breakfast and we later set off in search of festivities. It took all of three seconds after leaving the hostel to start getting doused; locals especially love to get foreigners wet so we were moving targets. You'll start getting splashed early around 8:00 or 9:00. Then there's kind of a break during the peak heat, maybe noon til 15:00 but the water wars resume. A dry truce is supposed to happen around 18:00.

In the city, people gather on the streets and in any public water source, including fountains and pools. There is no shortage of street food and I enjoyed my fair share of fried things, fruits, grilled corn, fresh-pressed sugar cane juice and - wait, stop everything - ice cream.

After leaving the city, I'm glad I also got to experience some rural Thingyan celebrating after arriving at Thabarwa in Thanlyin. People, especially kids, are just as ready to soak you with water. Instead of trucks and stages, substitute motorbikes, village houses, small shops and buckets on the side of the road.

I have to admit at first, I thought this was an incredible waste of natural resources, but eventually realized it all evaporates and will come back during the rainy season. Did I mention how refreshing it is to be soaked with water when its ridiculously hot outside?


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I met some great people and made some amazing memories here in Yangon, Myanmar (Burma) April 2016. I'd love to know in the comments below if you think you could handle getting hit by fire hoses. :P

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