Heading to Maya Bay? You won’t be allowed in the water

 Tourists will not be allowed to play in the seawater in Maya Bay in Krabi’s Hat Noppharat Thara-Mu Ko Phi Phi National Park as it would affect blacktip reef sharks and coral reefs, Marine biologist Dr Thon Thamrongnawasawat announced in a Facebook post on Tuesday.
His post came after an official decision that the crescent-shaped Maya Bay – which became famous after it was featured in the 2000 Hollywood blockbuster “The Beach” – would be reopened from January 1. The beach has been closed to tourists since June 2018.

Thon said three proposals have been approved by provincial government agencies:

1. Boats carrying no more than 375 people will park at the pier located behind Maya Bay which is being constructed.

2. Tourists must make a reservation in advance to enter Maya Bay, while the number of boat trips depends on a decision by the national park.

3. Tourists will not be allowed to play in the Maya Bay seawater as the beach is considered a nursery for blacktip reef sharks, while coral reefs in the area are recovering.

“I would like to emphasise that the reopening of Maya Bay will not affect the coral reefs and creatures in the area,” Thon wrote.

He thanked the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation and Natural Resources as well as Environment Minister Varawut Silpa-archa for “taking good care of the environment”, which is considered a national treasure. – The Nation

Source  - BangkokJack

 

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#Thailand - Limiting tourists on the most popular islands

The Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation held a meeting at the Pearl Hotel on Phuket on Tuesday to discuss the excessive numbers of tourists visiting the famous islands and bays.

Songtham Suksawang, chief of the DNP’s National Parks Office, who chaired the meeting, said that the amount of tourists in marine national parks was directly affecting the environment.

“Those national parks, especially marine national parks, are suffering from an oversupply of visitors. There are many problems such as oil from boats, rubbish and the effect on the local lifestyle on the islands, which is difficult to rehabilitate in the short term. They [meeting participants] discussed rearranging of the marine national parks to better meet the demand, but by limiting supply and providing a more sustainable solution,” he said.

“There will be a study on the limiting of tourism. Some locations have already had these studies done. After sending the officers to check, we found that there’s a specific period of time when the islands are overcrowded, which is 11am to 2pm when the tourists come onshore to rest and have lunch. There are approximately 2,000 to 3,000 people visiting some of the islands each day,” he added.

The DNP has plans for a solution on the Similan Islands by spreading tourists around the other islands, as Island Four and Island Eight are way too overcrowded.

“We will spread tourists to other islands, apart from Islands Four and Eight, by installing piers to connect them. They will be floating piers to avoid disturbing the corals. There will be a floating centre, where tourists can rest in front of the island, as well.''

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 “The purchasing process of the centres will be completed by March 31. We will start this project near the islands that are highly overcrowded, such as Similan, Phi Phi and in Phang Nga Bay. The limitation of tourists according to the time of the day will also follow after the study is done,” Songtham explained.

  “The limiting of tourists and an increase in customer fees are possible if the environment continues to be damaged too much from tourism,” he pointed out.

The DNP will also create an e-ticket to enter the islands, which will possibly start with the Similans, Phi Phi and Phang Nga Bay, as this would also help solve the issue of transparency in national park management, the National Parks Office chief said.

For security, he said that he had approved budgets for ambulance and rescue boats and was currently coordinating with the Emergency Medical Institute of Thailand to provide assistance to tourists in the marine national park area.

In case of emergency, the 1669 hotline is also available 24/7.

Source - TheNation

 

Honouring the dead for a better life

Mon residents help tow the boat from the temple to the river. 

 The Mon community in Sangkhla Buri on Thailand's border with Myanmar pay respect to their ancestors by sending off a boat laden with food.

 
A boat loaded with food is towed into the water where it begins its slow journey to the afterlife.

 According to traditional beliefs, the seventh month in the lunar calendar is when restless spirits roam the earth. That seventh month usually falls around August or September and all over Asia, communities mark the festival of the hungry ghost in their own fashion.

Chinese-speaking communities celebrated the festival last week, burning paper money and papier-mache iPhones so that these will travel to the afterworld where they can be used by the spirits, as well as offering boiled chicken and sweets to appease the hungry ghosts. The Khmer, too, killed chickens, leaving small portions of food at crossroads to feed the dead.

 Mon women light candles for the departed souls.

 The Mon people in the western district of Sangkhla Buri, however, organise a much more festive occasion in memory of departed souls. They build a boat and load it with food then celebrate for two nights before tossing it into the water. This Mon ceremony is very rare, and draws both the curious and the culture buff to Thailand's western frontier for the rite.

Known as the Mon Floating Boat Festival, this year's festival is being held over the weekend of September 26 to 28.

"The ritual is known to the Mon as Pohamord, which roughly translates as the Boat of Offerings," says Arunya Chareonhongsa, a Mon resident of Kanchanburi's Sangkhla Buri district, as she recounts the origins and purpose of the Mon Floating Boat Festival.

 A Mon woman carries a tray of offerings on her head.

 The annual event sees Mon communities towing a full-sized, hand-crafted boat laden with food to the river, The food is left out to sate the appetites of the departed. Once a private and deeply religious ritual, today the festival brings in much-needed tourist revenue to this quiet area.

Thousands of visitors turn out every year during the rite to witness the boat being built, decorated then towed to the water.

The Floating Boat Festival not only commemorates departed Mon pilgrims but also banishes evil and brings luck to those still living. It’s a ritual that dates back to the Mon Hanthawaddy Kingdom (1369-1539) and marks the journey of a high-ranking monk and several Buddhist pilgrims across the Bay of Bengal to fetch a set of Buddhist scriptures in Sri Lanka. On their return trip, one boat capsized in rough seas and the pilgrims inside it drowned.

Every year since, the Mon have built a large boat and piled it high with offerings before sending it out to sail on the river to feed those departed pilgrims.

For the Mon who live outside the district, the festival is a home-coming and a chance to mix with friends and relatives in one of the largest and most rustic Mon communities in Thailand.

On the first day locals and visitors surround the Chedi Phutthakhaya at Wat Wang Wiwekaram to watch as the men shape long bamboo poles into a boat, a process that usually takes a full day.

While the men are building the bamboo boat, the women busy themselves cooking and preparing the offerings, which mostly consist of popcorn, ripe bananas and boiled rice in banana leaves, candles, honey, water and sticks of sugarcane.

When the boat is ready and decorated with colourful paper flags, it is moved to the front of the huge pagoda where it serves as the centrepiece for the celebrations that follow on the next two nights.

The highlight is the series of cultural shows that showcase the distinctive ways of the Mon. Whether old or young, they dress in beautiful traditional attire - red sarongs and white shirts - and move towards the boat holding trays. Young men, with mouthfuls of chewy betel nut and winning smiles, try to lure the girls who carrying baskets of food on their heads.

"In the olden days, we also made a lantern and would load it with yellow string and the necessities for entering the monkhood before releasing it into the sky," Arunya explains. "Whoever got the monk set would be ordained.

"If a woman found it, she would make a great contribution to the Buddhist temple."

The ceremony culminates in the boat being towed to the riverbank and pushed out to the water where it begins its slow journey to the spiritual world.

IF YOU GO

n Sitting on the large reservoir created by the Khao Laem Dam, Sangkhla Buri is a home to one of Thailand's largest Mon communities as well as to Karenni and Bangladeshi populations that add to its ethnic diversity.

n It draws visitors for its Mon Wood Bridge and Mon temple with a bronze pyramid-shaped Chedi and is a good starting point a day trip to the Three Pagoda Check Point, where visitors, provided they bring a passport and photo, can get a day pass to Payathonsu inside Myanmar.

 The Mon Floating Boat Festival takes place around Chedi Phutthakhaya at Wat Wang Wiwekaram, Sangkhla Buri. 

Source: The Nation

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