Buddhist holiday

Festivities at the temple

Today is a Buddhist holiday, the Pavarana. I went to the nearby temple to observe the festivities. People were nicely dressed, each carrying a silver or gold bowl in which they brought their offerings: balls of sticky rice, flowers, pieces of fruit, homemade sweets wrapped in banana leaves, packaged candy bars and chocolates as well as bills of money. They placed all of that on a table before entering the temple for the service, led by several monks. I didn’t feel comfortable taking photos of people praying so I didn’t. I felt enough of a voyeur just watching them.

Children line up for sweets

Afterwards, several men sorted the stuff that was offered on the table, taking the money separately, placing the different types of food in different baskets and they carried it away. Children were allowed to take individual pieces of the sweets so they lined up for their share of the spoils.

Sharing sweets with a group of local men

A group of men who were sitting on a carpet outside the temple invited me over and offered me a banana leaf wrapped sweet. They asked where I was from and I replied as I usually do:

“From Slovenia,” clarified by “Europe” because no one has ever heard of Slovenia in this part of the world.

One of the men surprised me by reciting:

“Slovenia, population 2 million, bordered by Austria, Italy and Croatia.”

Wow, I was impressed! I asked him how he knew that and he just shrugged,

“I looked at a map.”