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The Truth Behind Thailand’s Full Moon Party in The White Lotus

BBG News

In the fifth episode of Season 3, the characters Chelsea, Chloe, Saxon, and Lochlan from “The White Lotus” series departed to the Thai island of Koh Phangan, where they joined the tradition of many partygoers by attending a Full Moon Party.

By the 1990s, attending a Full Moon Party had been firmly ingrained as a rite of passage for backpackers. Tens of thousands make the pilgrimage to this isle of indulgence every month, staggering along the silver sand while clutching buckets of whiskey, cola, and potent local Red Bull, and daubed in luminous paint, as beach bars blast out techno until the wee hours—just like Lotus creator Mike White faithfully captured on screen. However, the spirit of the Full Moon Party has waxed and waned since its heady inception and continues to shift today.

Thailand has drawn a diverse group of adventurous travelers since the 1960s. The number increased significantly when the Iranian Revolution and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan closed the famous “hippie trail” from Europe to Kathmandu’s Freak Street in 1979. Instead, barefoot flower children, seeking escapism from Western materialism, journeyed further east on a cloud of marijuana fumes and budget airline tickets. They found self-discovery and self-healing in Southeast Asia instead.

At first, they congregated on the Thai Gulf island of Koh Samui, where the Lotus resort is set, and which at the time was a palm-fringed paradise best known for farming coconuts. But the opening of the island’s airport in 1989 heralded the dawn of mass tourism, prompting the disgruntled beatniks to roam farther afield in search of Buddhist nirvana. Word spread about a beautiful beach called Haad Rin, a one-mile strip of pearl-white sand flanked by rocky outcrops on the southern tip of neighboring Koh Phangan, which was only accessible by longtail boat or an epic trudge through jungle paths.

Koh Phangan was already famed for a pristine natural beauty that prompted Thailand’s revered King Chulalongkorn to visit 14 times during his reign. Each evening, the crystal-clear water erupted in a kaleidoscope of bioluminescence, while Reiki students could dig up amethyst and tourmaline from crystal seams that crisscrossed the island. Before long, Sannyasin followers of the Rajneesh new religious movement flocked there from India.

How the Full Moon Party came about is a matter of some debate. Joe Cummings, author of the original Lonely Planet Thailand, believes it was started by Haad Rin’s Tommy Resort in 1987. He first attended two years later and found 12,000 people partying in transcendental harmony. Instead of alcohol, “ganja and magic mushrooms were being sold openly,” Cummings tells TIME. “And probably some other things passed around from person to person.” Back then, there was only one music source, which helped the party feel integrated, he recalls.

However, Nattakit Libprapakorn, 33, who today runs Haad Rin’s Phangan Bayshore resort started by his mother, believes the original Full Moon Party was a going away bash thrown by neighboring Paradise Bungalows for the girlfriend of one of the owners. “Back in the day, there wasn’t much electricity, so they chose the time with the most moonlight,” he says. “So it started from a family gathering and then just expanded.”

Whatever the true origin, expand it did. At its peak around 2010, some 20,00-30,000 revelers were flocking to the Full Moon Party every month. But as commercialization took hold, the event metastasized into a pit of hard drugs, drunkenness, and debauch a world apart from its bohemian origins. This “Paradise Lost” dynamic was immortalized by Alex Garland’s 1996 best-selling novel The Beach, which spawned the Danny Boyle film adaptation starring Leonardo DiCaprio four years later. (Notably, both Boyle and White employed the same artistic license of spurning Koh Phangan’s low-lying topography to instead film amid the more dramatic limestone karst cliffs of Thailand’s western Andaman Coast.)

Other than the monthly influx to Haad Rin’s expanding array of hotels and guesthouses, many thousands more would hit a Full Moon Party via the half-hour crossing from neighboring Koh Samui—much like our Lotus chums—arriving at dusk to shake a tailfeather till dawn. However, rather than billionaire yachts they’d pile into whatever repurposed fishing boat was making a quick buck that evening and sinkings were all too common. Some passengers even complained of being extorted in the middle of the ocean.

The crowds became rowdier and that bygone innocence got overrun by reports of rapes, suicides, fatal accidents, and gang-related murder. Koh Phangan and neighboring islands became notorious for the forced labor of undocumented migrants from war-torn Myanmar. When your reporter first attended a Full Moon Party in 2001, amphetamines were being openly sold as “diet pills” at beachside pharmacies, whose other main revenue stream was tending to intoxicated partygoers suffering burns from ill-advised fire dancing. Thai waiting staff who had never left the island spoke in perfect cockney accents owing to the revolving door of Londoners to whom they served beer and spliffs.

What Adventurers, Dancers, and Freaks Seek and Find on Thailand’s Magic Island, describes. Instead of witnessing mystical experiences over the Gulf of Thailand at dawn, now you might find people engaging in fistfights on the beach at 2 a.m.

Ultimately, the pandemic provided Haad Rin a welcome reset. The Full Moon Parties paused as international tourism to Thailand ground to a halt. Koh Phangan once again reverted to a haven away from the hustle and bustle of modern life.

Nattakit used the COVID lull to renovate his resort, which from a peak of 142 rooms today only has 80, albeit much swankier than his parents ever envisioned. He says business is better as guests stay through the month to appreciate the stunning natural beauty rather than just one night’s party. “After COVID, people are nicer, not the crazy partygoer like back in the day,” he recalls. “I feel there’s a different vibe and people are calmer.”

Rather than the backpackers of yore, since COVID the island has experienced an influx of long-term families, especially Russians and Israelis seeking to escape turmoil at home. Two international hospitals have sprung up to cater to the moneyed new arrivals. However, the swelling population has further stressed local infrastructure. Trash burning and water shortages are a worsening blight, while the construction of upscale villas has denuded vegetation and exacerbated a perennial flooding problem.

When musician and restaurateur Hardy Hemingway first moved to Koh Phangan in 2012, the entire economy was based around the party. “The island was busy for a week on either side of the full moon and that was it,” he says. “Now that has definitely changed.”

Today, Koh Phangan is better known for detox centers, spas, and wellness resorts. The island also has some of Asia’s best conditions for kitesurfing. Haad Rin has changed from hosting the island’s main draw to being one of its quietest beaches outside of full moon week. 

Cummings remarked, ‘In our previous discussions, you often brought up Koh Phangan and the Full Moon Party.’ Now, it seems that topic isn’t being discussed as much.’

While this nuance is understandably missing from White’s fleeting depiction, his characters’ carousing amid buckets and bonfires—and subsequent angst-ridden hazy recollections—will certainly strike a chord with Haad Rin veterans. The question is whether Lotus fame will rekindle international attention and propel the Full Moon Party back to its sybaritic former glory. 

Having grown up in the Full Moon Party’s shadow, Nattakit has mixed feelings. He’s cognizant of how many locals still rely on it to support their families, while also thinking that perhaps it has had its day. “Many people can only make money during the party time,” he says. “But I am a bit against it. I appreciate the beauty of nature here and I don’t want it to be ruined.”

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2025-03-17 10:09

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