On the morning of April 13th, which is the first day of Songkran, I went to watch a parade in Paknam City. There were hundreds of people lined up on each side of the road as the floats and processions passed by. It was very hot watching the parade but we were cooled down with people squirting water at us and even poring cold water down our necks!

The first float to pass us was for Nang Songkran (Miss Songkran). You can tell the exact time and date for the start of songkran by which animal she is upon. This year is was a tiger.

You can see from these pictures how crowded it was. It is Thai tradition to pour water on people as well as smear some wet powder on their faces. You can see in the right picture that even the novice monk wasn't left out!

The parade went on for quite a long time with people singing and dancing and having a good fun. Once everything was finished many of them would go off to have some more fun playing water fights with their friends.