Bun Khao Saht - Celebration of the Dead



Villagers Make Offerings to the Spirits of Family Members



Tuesday was a special day in Isaan.  September 5th, this year, is Bun Khao Saht also known as Boun Khao Salak or "Celebration of the Dead" in neighboring Lao People's Democratic Republic (Laos).  It is the Mid-Autumn Festival or Moon Festival held on the day of the tenth Full Moon of the lunar calendar.  For Westerners the moon is called the "Harvest Moon".

On this special day, merit making is performed by offering food to the Phii (ghosts) of family members.  People also earn merit through offering a special treat called "Kao Tawtek" to their local Monks.  Kao Tawtek is a mixture of freshly popped rice, caramel, peanuts, shredded coconut and millet.  It is made in backyards, front yards, and side yards throughout Isaan just prior to Wan Kao Saht - typically in huge woks over wood fires. It is also traditional on this day for older people to give gifts of Kao Tawtek and money to children.

Like many things here in Thailand, Bun Khao Saht seems to be adapted and amalgamated from other cultures. The Chinese celebrate a Hungry Ghost Festival and "Ghost Day" around the same time.  In Vietnam, the second biggest holiday with an emphasis and focus on children is celebrated at this time of the year.

I drove out to Tahsang Village, my wife's home village, early in the morning to be able to participate in the daily merit making ritual of offering food to the Monks.  This has been one of the most wet monsoon seasons since I have been in Thailand, even more than last year.  Since we returned to Thailand from our trip to America on July 18th, we have had rain all but three days.  Mud is everywhere and some of the country roads have moving water flowing across them.  Of course the combination of rain and traffic is taking a heavy toll on all the roads.  Potholes and failing pavement are now the norm.

Just as I reached her village to make the turn to drive through the fields where the Wat is located a truck stopped in front of me.  The driver, who I recognized, motioned that he wanted to talk.  Through his limited use of English, my limited knowledge of Thai/Lao, and a great deal of pantomime, I understood that the normal route was closed and I should follow him.

After an even more circuitous route on an even more bumpy road covered with more mud as well as puddles through the towering sugar cane fields, we made it to Wat Pha That Nong Mat.

On Bun Khao Saht, in addition to earning personal merit, the participants earn merit for the spirits of their dead relatives.  It is especially important to make offerings to family members who died during the year since that last Bun Khao Saht.

In the Lao Loum culture, as well as other Southeast Asia cultures, the people have to take care of the spirits of their family as well as other ghosts.  Spirits need merit in death as well in life to assist them in their journey to enlightenment.  Merit is the basis for determining what form and status a person will be reincarnated as in a future life.

Villagers Make Offering of Food for the Monks

The villagers, in addition to the normal offerings of food for the Monks, had brought baskets of special foods wrapped in banana leaves.  The baskets were carefully placed on the floor of the newly completed Viharn (several years under construction but finished now) next to a concrete column.  A sai sin (sacred cotton string) was placed across the tops of the baskets.  The sai sin ran up the column, across the Viharn and ran down a second column near where the Monks sat slightly above the villagers.  The sai sin terminated in a ball placed on a plate at the side of the Wat's senior Monk.  The sai sin connects this world to other worlds, the laypeople to the Monks and conveys the merit making to the deceased people.

Many of the women were dressed in white uniforms like the attire that Duang wears just about every night when she conducts her ritual upstairs in our home where my roll top desk has been converted into a shrine.  The women, including Duang and her mother, were participating in a women's retreat at the Wat.  They spent the remainder of the day and most of the night reading and studying the scriptures and receiving lectures from the Monks.

Monks Select their Food from the Offerings Made to Them

The offering of food to the Monks was a typical daily ritual with one exception, while the Monks ate their one meal of the day, the women in the white costumes along with a couple of Brahmans chanted in Pali for most of the time.

Prior to Start of Daily Food Offering Ritual, Monks Bless Food Offerings to the Spirits

At the end of the daily food offering ritual, the villagers gathered up their baskets and went outside. The villagers scattered throughout the Wat grounds selecting specific trees to stop at before going to their family tat where the bones of their family are interned.  The offerings made at the trees were for family members who died prior to the family having enough money to buy a tat as a repository for their bones.

Duang's Mother Lights Two Candles for Offering to the Spirit of her Husband

The food was placed upon banana leaves and consisted of peeled fruits, sticky rice, chili sauces, dried fish, kao tawtek and other typical Isaan foods.  Off to the side was a banana leaf with betel-nut chewing items.  After the foods were laid out, water was poured over them as the family members communicated to the spirits.

Water Is Poured Over the Offering In the Act of Transference of Merit

The offerings to the spirits also included two lit yellow candles and two sprigs of "dogkhut" - I suspect Thai jasmine buds.  When offerings are made to the Buddha, three of each item are offered - one for Buddha, one for the teachings of Buddha (Dhamma), and one for the Buddhist religious community (Sanga).  For spirits the offerings are in pairs.

After the family spirits residing in the tats had been offered food and drink, the people hung filled thin banana leaf packets in the trees throughout the grounds.  The banana packets contained food offerings to the other family spirits whose bones were not interned in the tat.



Duang and some other women, made food offerings to the spirits of relatives whose bones are kept in highly decorated steeple or spire shaped structures called "Tats".  Tats are reliquaries for bone chips of departed ancestors.  More affluent villagers have a free standing tat and those less affluent will often have a niche inside of the block walls that surround Wats.

After a while, around ten minutes, one of the men rang the Wat's large bell three times signifying that the spirits had completed eating.  The small banana leaf packets were quickly removed from the trees and returned to the family baskets.  The packets will later be placed in the sugar cane fields, rice paddies, and other lands to feed the spirits (ghosts)  that inhabit them.  In return for feeding the hungry ghosts, the people ask that the spirits watch over the land and its crops bringing success as well as good luck to the owners.


The villagers returned to the Viharn to have a community meal with the food leftover from the offerings to the Monks.  There is always too much food offered to the Monks and since they are allowed to take only what they can eat that morning for their one meal of the day ensuring that there are always "leftovers".