The other day, a friend was telling me about a festival in his hometown; it’s called the Bali Jatra, and it celebrates the day that all the merchants were expelled and fled to Bali in the 11th century. I’m impressed by what seems to have been an early anti-capitalist gesture that’s still being celebrated a thousand years later. And the residents honor it by launching intricately folded paper boats out across the river.
 

In my mind, I always see them lighted—a finely folded flotilla precise in candelabra, gliding off and glowing amber—though clearly not from candles, as the lights don’t flicker and the boats don’t burn down, and yet, I’ve never been able to figure out where the light comes from.
 

But it turns out that I got it all wrong—it is called the Bali Jatra, but it’s actually a celebration of the establishment of trade with far distant lands. And they do launch paper boats, and they are lit up, but there’s no mystery about it—each boat does carry a small candle, and given the nature of fire and paper, sooner or later, they do all go up in flames, becoming floating torches, each a tiny riot on its way outward, and the children on the banks clap and laugh and wave good riddance.