The Wandering Souls Festivals

(15th of lunar July)

Every year the 15th of lunar July brings back in me so many vivid memories of the Wandering Souls Festivals in Saigon when I was a little boy. On this evening when I was about 8 or 9, I would go around to neighbouring houses and waited patiently at the gates and jumped fighting among many other kids about my age for the foods like sugar cane pieces, cake, sweets thrown out of the door.

This is what I know of the origin and the meaning of this day:

A widely told story tells that once a Buddhist monk named Muc Kien Lien, upon reaching enlightenment, exercised the mind' s eye searching through many worlds and found his mother who had died several years ago, in Hell, deprived of food and reduced to only skin and bones.

Deeply moved and saddened, Muc Kien Lien, using magic power, succeeded in travelling to Hell where he was received by the King of Hell and shown around to see all the terrible tortures that the prisoners there had to bear. There were ponds and rivers full of poisonous snakes and other monstrous creatures which tore to pieces all the criminals who were pushed off from the bridge high above by the devils. Those who had harmed other people while living on earth by cheating, telling lies, throwing insults and vicious words at others, had to lie on beds of sharp nails or have their teeth pulled out one by one by the devils. Many other prisoners were screaming frantically as the devils, using stridents, were pushing them down under the boiling oil inside huge vats. The whole place was an eery and frightening sight filled with smoke, burning flesh and blood and bones, crying, moaning and groaning.

The warden of Hell explained to the monk about Hell and which crime deserved which punishment. In the end Muc Kien Lien met his mother. She was locked up in one of the cells and was undergoing heavy punishment because in the living world she had been mean, nasty and greedy, lending money at exorbitant rates, taking advantage of the poor\rquote s narrow circumstances to sell rice at cut-throat prices, and always blaspheming and calling down curses upon others.

Feeling shocked and pain for his old mother, Muc Kien Lien took a bowl of rice and gave it to her. The wicked woman, whose old greed flared up after having been starved for so long, quickly covered the bowl with her left hand for fear that other prisoners might snatch it from her, and with the fingers of her right hand picked up some rice and put into her mouth. The habitual greed and wickedness of her previous life still possessed the woman and presently her greed grew so intense that it caused the rice to burst into flames as soon as it  reached her mouth.

Bewildered and overwhelmed with immense distress, the monk returned to the Buddha weeping, told him all that he had witnessed in Hell and begged the Buddha to show him the way to save his mother.

The Buddha said: "Oh Muc Kien Lien! Your mother, by the seed of  of her greed and wickedness, has created a bad karma. As a consequence she has been reincarnated into a starving devil. You alone cannot save her. A single tiny boat can carry a big mountain, a slender string can pull a big log. Only with the help of the venerable monks from ten directions can you free your mother's soul from suffering. Oh! Muc Kien Lien! The 15th of July is the day of Buddhist jubilation. You have to prepare offerings of five coloured fruits, a hundred food dishes, incense, clothing, towels... You personally will have to come and perform a ceremony to pray for the salvation of your mother."

Muc Kien Lien obeyed Buddha and did as he was told and later was delighted to find his mother released from Hell and reborn into a happy world.

That' s the origin of the Mid-July festival or LÍ Vu Lan (or Cuùng Coâ Hoàn in everyday Vietnamese language). Every year on this day most Vietnamese, following Muc Kien Lien' s example, make offerings to pray for their parents, if they are still living , to enjoy good health and longevity. If they are dead, they will be reborn into a happy world.

In practise, on 15th of lunar July, many Vietnamese families put offerings of fruit, cake, nuts, sugar-cane pieces and imitation money on a tray. After prayers for the homeless souls have been said by the family head everything from the tray is thrown into the street in front of the house where all the neighbouring children are waiting to pick it up, struggling among themselves. In pagodas crowds of Buddhist followers come to pray for their loved ones who are now dead.

Because of its origin as an act of filial piety towards a mother, the Mid-July festival has, in Vietnam,  become something like the Mother' s Day in European culture.