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by Delaney Dobson
Every year in August, different countries across Asia recognize a traditional Chinese festival where attendees pay homage to their deceased ancestors. Known as “ghost month,” the Hungry Ghost Festival features offerings of food and “hell money” to please the ghosts while the gates of hell are opened. This year, photojournalist Jack Kurtz attended the festival in Thailand where he currently lives, saying that it was a perfect fit for his natural style:
My work is documentary/street photography and covering religious holidays in Thailand gives me the perfect opportunity to do that. There’s a rich tradition of photography here and Thais are very tolerant of photography and photographers. It’s relatively easy to cover events like the Hungry Ghost Festival.
Vietnamese Buddhist monks lead a service for Ghost Month at the Ruby Goddess Shrine in Dusit section of Bangkok.
A person lights candles before praying at Pek Leng Keng Mangkorn Khiew Shrine.
Though photographing the festival proved to be an excellent place to learn the religious traditions of Thailand, the general size of the event created problems for Jack when shooting.
The hardest part of covering events like this in Thailand is finding out when and where they’ll be happening. Sunday, Aug. 10, was the first day of Ghost Month and the most important day of the festival, but there were events at Chinese Buddhist and Taoist Shrines all over Bangkok. Some of the shrines are tiny – smaller than a one car garage in the US, and it’s very hard to find schedules for them.
People line up in the street before food distribution started at Pek Leng Keng Mangkorn Khiew Shrine.
People receiving food from the distribution at Pek Leng Keng Mangkorn Khiew Shrine.
While covering the festival has been a project in itself, covering Ghost Month is only a part of Jack’s large project on the religious diversity of Thailand and how it is changing.
So far the reaction has been positive. There’s a perception that Thailand is all Buddhist but there’s actually a lot of religious diversity here and people are usually surprised to learn that. Even though the people celebrating Hungry Ghost are Buddhist, they’re mostly Mahayana Buddhist (the sect of Buddhism common in China, Korea, northern Vietnam, and Japan), while Thais are mostly Theravada Buddhists (the sect of Buddhism common in Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, and Southern Vietnam). The Chinese community here is large and active and you really see that during Chinese Buddhist holidays.
Cooked rice ready for distribution to people at Pek Leng Keng Manghorn Khiew Shrine in Bankok.
A woman burns joss paper and hell money- [faux money printed to resemble legal tender bank notes] on the first day of Ghost Month in a back alley in Bankoks Chinatown.
People pray at an alter at Pek Leng Keng Mangkorn Khiew Shrine.
A member of the Lehigh Leng Kaitoung Opera troupe applies her makeup before a performance at Chaomae Thapthim Shrine, a small Chinese shrine in a working class neighborhood of Bangkok.
Jack plans to transition into a longer-term project to document the ever-changing landscape of the Thailand spiritual and religious culture.
Thailand is an amazingly diverse place. Every time I think I’m starting to figure it out, I learn something new and gain a new appreciation for the complexities of this country.
To see more of Jack’s work in Thailand, visit his site!