Chiang Mai hosts Thai style Halloween to make merit for ghosts

Thai people in the Mae Jo Town Municipality of the San Sai district in Chiang Mai province joined the northern Thai-style Halloween event and parade on Saturday to make merit for ghosts and souls from hell.

People in the northern part of Thailand believe that ghosts and souls rise from hell to visit their relatives and ask for merits on every full moon day of the 12th month in the lunar calendar, which is called Sip Song Peng Day.

Locals will go to temples or invite monks to their houses to take part in the merit-making ceremony to send merit to the souls suffering in hell.

Sip Song Peng Day of this year fell on Saturday, September 10. Aside from making merit, locals also joined the ghost parade called Lan Na Halloween which is a northern Thai style Halloween. Locals dressed up as ghosts, angels, and fairies to join the event. Monks also walked in the parade too.

The Mayor of the Mae Jo Town Municipality Office, Prayat Songkam, informed the media that the Lan Na Halloween was held for the first time in two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic. It was a nine-day event starting from September 2 to September 10.

Prayat said the participants of the parade were separated into three groups: locals who dressed up as ghosts representing the bad people who died and stayed in hell, locals who dressed up as angels and fairies representing good people who died and stayed in heaven, and the last group were monks from Mae Kaet Noi Temple in the San Sai district.

The abbot of the Mae Kaet Noi Temple, Phra Khu Wisarn Jariyakhun, revealed that he hoped the event would encourage locals to make merit and behave themselves.

SOURCE: MGR Online | Channel 7 | Chiangmai News