Thai Time for New Year

If you love Thai food and are interested in the sights and sounds of Thailand, you need travel no farther than the San Fernando Valley this weekend.

The Wat Thai Temple in North Hollywood, the largest Theravada Buddhist temple in the United States, will observe the Thai New Year, known as Songkran, with a festival featuring food, classical dancing, music and, at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, a Miss Songkran beauty contest.

About 1,000 people are expected to attend the popular event. Free shuttle buses will take visitors from the parking lot at nearby Kaiser Permanente Hospital to the temple.

Young Thai Americans have received instruction in recent months from two volunteer classical music teachers from Thailand, Wilaiwan Nikum and Orawan Atiwannapat.

A glimpse through the door of the rehearsal area this week revealed intense youngsters playing traditional instruments.

“We have beauty. People should see it. It’s like a flower in bloom,” Monk Somchai Baoman said.

Songkran festivities are thought to have originated as a harvest and fertility ceremony, which took on additional meaning as a Day of Gratitude, in which parents and elders are ceremonially paid respect by their children and young people. This involves “sprinkling scented water on the hands and shoulders of elders, relatives and friends as a sign of bonding and respect,” Baoman said.

The public celebrations will begin with monks chanting, delivering sermons and receiving traditional alms and food. In the afternoon, there will be a formal water ceremony honoring the temple’s Buddha image and family members.

Preparation of special foods and traditional gift items is part of the observance, and both will be on sale in abundance.

BE THERE

Thai New Year-Songkran Festival, Saturday and Sunday 7 a.m.-4 p.m., Wat Thai Temple, 8225 Coldwater Canyon Blvd., North Hollywood. Parking at Kaiser Permanente Hospital, 13652 Cantara St., with free shuttle and admission. (818) 780-4200.