Hundreds of Thai men with swords,
spears, metal tubes and various sharp objects pierced through their
cheeks and other body parts took to the streets to celebrate their
annual vegetarian festival.
Please, scroll down for photos. Warning: graphic content!
The Vegetarian Festival is a nine-day period in October that celebrates the abstinence from meat during the ninth lunar month of the Chinese calendar.
During this period eating meat, drinking alcohol and having
sex are thought to be vices and pollutants of the body
and mind to be cut out entirely by the truly devoted.
It is celebrated throughout the entire country, but the
festivities are at their height in Phuket, where about 35%
of the population is Thai Chinese.
It attracts crowds of spectators to look at the devotees
who engage in extreme acts of self-mutilation. They
believe that it will help them obtain good health, peace
of mind and purify their souls.
In accordance with the traditions, many religious devotees
perform ritualized mutilation upon themselves and one
another while under a trance-like state.
This is done without anesthetic, always inside or near the
temples surrounded by other devotees with only iodine,
petroleum jelly and surgical gloves as precautionary
measures.
Luckily, few people ever need to have prolonged medical
treatment, and although in the weeks after the festival
many people will be seen covered in bandages, scarring
is uncommon, stitching is rare.
Return to daily activity for the devotees occurs shortly
after the completion of the ritual, frequently before the
festival ends unless performed on the last days, much
sooner than before the bandages themselves are removed.
Please, scroll down for photos. Warning: graphic content!
The Vegetarian Festival is a nine-day period in October that celebrates the abstinence from meat during the ninth lunar month of the Chinese calendar.
sex are thought to be vices and pollutants of the body
and mind to be cut out entirely by the truly devoted.
festivities are at their height in Phuket, where about 35%
of the population is Thai Chinese.
who engage in extreme acts of self-mutilation. They
believe that it will help them obtain good health, peace
of mind and purify their souls.
perform ritualized mutilation upon themselves and one
another while under a trance-like state.
temples surrounded by other devotees with only iodine,
petroleum jelly and surgical gloves as precautionary
measures.
treatment, and although in the weeks after the festival
many people will be seen covered in bandages, scarring
is uncommon, stitching is rare.
after the completion of the ritual, frequently before the
festival ends unless performed on the last days, much
sooner than before the bandages themselves are removed.
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