Phuket Opinion: A festival full of firecrackers

[Lite Beer]

Phuket Opinion: A festival full of firecrackers

Honoring one’s ancestors is one thing, but setting off large, dangerous fireworks for sheer fun is another thing entirely. Image: Gazette Graphics

PHUKET: Credit must be given where it is clearly due: to the authorities who arrested more than 20 people for the illegal use or sale of dangerous fireworks during the recently concluded Vegetarian Festival.

The Phuket Provincial Police have sent out somewhat mixed signals in recent years with regard to what level of fireworks usage would be allowed during traditional cultural festivities, many of which are connected to the island’s heritage and deep links to China.

In general, the message over the past decade has been that traditional firecrackers in strips would be acceptable, while anything larger or with more explosive power would not.

Any Phuket resident who has observed these firework-centric traditions can testify that the enforcement of regulations on the island has been mostly nonexistent – until now. In past years at this time there were reports of victims, many of them young children, who lost an eye, finger or ear drum due to these dangerous explosives.

A simple ‘cost-benefit’ analysis on the use of fireworks needs to be performed. Let’s look at the benefits first. There is the belief that these pyrotechnics might be useful at warding off evil spirits. And we are told that firecrackers and fireworks in general are an important part of the cultural and religious traditions of China. By association, they are an important way for Phuket’s Chinese population to express their reverence for and identification with such traditions.

Yet ancestor worship is another vital Chinese tradition, and one that extends much further back than firecrackers. Surely Chinese culture and tradition is much older and more grand than is warranted by association with noisy, toxic explosives.

On the ‘cost’ side, there is not enough space here to even begin an accurate accounting. Apart from all the people who have been maimed or even killed, the Chinese fireworks industry is almost completely unregulated and a well-known source of not only noise pollution, but also a producer of toxic fumes from a variety of elements that include strontium, dioxins, aluminum and other particulates – hardly substances that the well-intended spirit of any ancestor would want to see their descendants ingest.

And in this age of global warming and “sufficiency economy” any discussion of the costs also has to take into account the preposterousness of the mass production, shipping and sale of a product which has as its sole purpose the creation of noise for very short-term excitement.

There is no denying the importance of Chinese traditions in the development of Phuket’s own culture. However, despite the Vegetarian Festival being an important event that relies heavily on the use of explosives, the use of fireworks during this and similar events needs to be more tightly controlled for the benefit of all island residents.

Source: http://www.phuketgazette.net/phuket_news/2013/Phuket-Opinion-A-festival-full-of-firecrackers-22532.html

-- Phuket Gazette 2013-10-20

[Dap]

I would be interested to know if there is any actual cultural or religious

significance attached to the fireworks in relation to "honoring" the

Chinese ancestors. Anyone?

[phuketsub]

I would be interested to know if there is any actual cultural or religious

significance attached to the fireworks in relation to "honoring" the

Chinese ancestors. Anyone?

I looked into that, but all I kept getting is that they are thought to be effective at warding off 'evil spirits' -- those not of ancestors, of course.

I don't believe they are meant to honor ancestors, but rather to protect the living against ill-intentioned souls.

[Dap]

I would be interested to know if there is any actual cultural or religious

significance attached to the fireworks in relation to "honoring" the

Chinese ancestors. Anyone?

I looked into that, but all I kept getting is that they are thought to be effective at warding off 'evil spirits' -- those not of ancestors, of course.

I don't believe they are meant to honor ancestors, but rather to protect the living against ill-intentioned souls.

I thank ye' kindly squire.

[Halion]

Perhaps the may want to carry this crusade down to the insurgents in the "restive south".

[me313]

The Thai people living behind the wall of my housing complex seem to have evil spirits and yet they were exploding what sounded like miniature bombs every night, sometimes into the 11th hour and they have not come out any more pure than before the festival.

[FireMedic]

I guess the 2 young guys who dropped the football size bomb off their motorbike thought I was an evil spirit. At first I thought they threw a cigarette, until I got closer and saw the flicker, flicker, BOOOOOOM right next to my bike. A piece of something flew up and hit my leg, arm, and face. Thanks a lot for the hearing loss in my right ear.

[newarrior]

Had tinnitus and hearing loss since 1996--both conditions are getting worse and worse--along with soi dogs loud noise and my inability to do most night related things are the 2 main reasons I DON"T move to Thailand...too sad :-(

[IrishIvan]

Yes lets all move to Thailand and once we get here we can westernise the natives. Its like a person moving under an airport runway and then complaining that it interferse with their lives