1.
The festival lasts from Sept. 27-Oct. 5, and most performers refrain from eating meat for at least three days prior to its opening.
2.
The festival began in 1825, when a traveling opera company fell ill while touring in the Kathu district of Phuket, Thailand. The prescribed cure for their severe stomach ailment was a strict vegetarian diet, horning the emperor gods Kiew Ong Tai The and Yok Ong Sone Teh. After they miraculously recovered, the locals began to mimic not just the company's diet, but their act as well.