Thai festival pays homage to gods

Residents of I-san in Thailand are gearing up for the Khao Phanom Rung Festival, which will see people making the pilgrimage to the summit of the mountain to pay their respects to the gods.

The festival on April 1st and April 2nd is popular with tourists keen to see the more spiritual side to Thailand, and there a series of events to celebrate the pilgrimage, which is felt should be made at least once in a lifetime.

Visitors can observe a performance of ancient propitiation rituals to appease the gods, deities and other celestial beings as well as local folk music and dramatisations.

The festival also includes a fair and a Khmer cultural trail exhibition, allowing visitors to gain some context and insight into what they are experiencing.

The expedition to the summit itself is not insignificant, with Phanom Rung Hill rising to 350 feet above the surrounding plain.

It is at the top of here that those who take part come to the Prasat Hin Khao Phanom Rung, a magnificent temple sanctuary, which was built between the 10th and 13th centuries.

If visitors manage to make it down for the festival, they are being advised to stay in the area for a few days longer, as astrologers have predicted that an extraordinary astro-archaeological phenomenon will occur at sunrise between April 3rd and 5th.

Experts have calculated that because the doors of the temple sanctuary are perfectly aligned, that at sunrise on a cloudless day during this period, the sun’s rays will shine through all fifteen doorways of the sanctuary in a single shaft of light.

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