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Chak Phra Festival
Surat Thani celebrates the official end of the annual 3-month Buddhist
Rains Retreat (Ok Phansa) in mid-October with the Chak Phra Festival
(literally 'the procession of hauling the Buddha image). The tradition
stems from the belief that the Buddha ascended to Heaven during
Phansa to preach to his mother. The festival marks the Buddha's
return to Earth, and is an occasion for religious merit-making and
general celebrations. Local people organise dazzling land and waterborne
processions of revered Buddha images (to symbolise the Buddha's
return to Earth) and boat races on the Tapi River where long boats,
manned by up to 50 oarsmen, are ebulliently raced. Religious devotion,
spectacle and merriment combine to make Surat Thani's Chak Phra
Festival a memorable annual event.
Rambutan Fair
The annual August fair celebrates the delicious fruit, first planted
in Surat Thani during 1926. Highlights include floats adorned with
rambutans and other fruits, exhibitions of local products and ornamental
plants, and demonstrations by specially trained monkeys who harvest
coconuts.
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