ROCKET FESTIVAL
The festival is a call for rain and a celebration of fertility. In the afternoon, people gather in the fields on the outskirts of villages and towns to launch self-made firework rockets. Different communities compete for the best decorated and the highest travelling rocket. Men disguised as women perform vaudeville acts using wooden phalli in order to anger the gods. As revenge, the gods are expected to send thunderstorms
Rocket festival or “Boon Bang Fai” in Thai is usually held in the second week of May of each year, at the beginning of the rainy season. The farmers are ready to cultivate their paddy fields. The festival is popularly celebrated in the northeastern provinces of Yasothorn and Ubon Ratchathani. The celebration is an entreaty to the rain god for plentiful rains during the coming rice planting season.