The Water-Splashing Festival, New Year's Day by Dai calendar, is celebrated around mid-April every year and lasts for three to seven days.

The festival is the traditional occasion for Dai ethnic minority and the most influential festival in Yunnan Province. People held activities such as dragon-boat racing, sending off skyrockets, and throwing love bags to celebrate the festival.

Usually held by the banks of the picturesque Lancang River (澜沧江, Láncāng River, one of the main rivers of southwest China), girls of Dai ethnic minority dip branches into the river and splash the water onto others as a way to express their best wishes. The climax of the water-splashing activity is when the people of the different ethnic groups attending the festival splash water upon each other, using basins and buckets. Although all the people are soaked to the skin, all participants are happy. It is believed that everyone being splashed at will have good luck.