The Phuket Vegetarian Festival

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The Phuket Vegetarian Festival is a colourful event held over a nine-day period in late September/early October. The festival celebrates the Chinese community's belief that abstinence from meat and various stimulants during the ninth lunar month of the Chinese calendar will help obtain good health and peace of mind.

Warning: Do not click the link if you are at all squeamish. If you are, it would be safer for you to proceed no further. The Phuket Vegetarian Festival is not for the faint hearted. Every year the island in Southern Thailand attracts thousands to witness the unusual - not to mention painful - religious rites performed there.

(via Robert-John)