Phi Ta Khon Festival — Dan Sai

About this Place

The Phi Ta Khon festival in the small town of Dan Sai, Loei province, is Thailand's most spectacularly bizarre and joyful celebration — a ghost festival where locals dress in elaborately crafted spirit costumes (hand-carved wooden masks and patchwork robes) and parade through town in an explosion of colour, noise, music, and playful mischief. The festival, sometimes called the Ghost Festival or Thai Halloween, honours a legendary occasion when the spirits of the forest accompanied Prince Wesandon (an incarnation of the Buddha) on his triumphant return to the city, joining the celebrations so exuberantly they could not be distinguished from the living. The masks are extraordinary folk art — carved from coconut palm spathes (flower clusters) and painted into fantastical faces with exaggerated wide eyes and gaping mouths. Buddhist ceremony is woven throughout the uninhibited street celebration, which runs over two to three days. Exact dates are set each year by the senior monk of Wat Phon Chai. Dan Sai has limited accommodation — book months ahead if attending. The masks are collected internationally as significant folk art.