MANZHA, China  Tucked away in China’s steamy tropical southwest are the villages of the Dai people, famous throughout the country for a raucous annual tradition: a water-splashing festival where the Dai douse one another for three days in the streets using any container they can get their hands on  buckets, wash basins, teacups, balloons, water guns.

But in Manzha and four surrounding villages, the springtime festival has taken on added significance  or insignificance, depending on how you look at it. Imagine a nonstop Mardi Gras with fire hoses: at a site called the Dai Minority Park, water-splashing extravaganzas take place every day.

Yuppies from China’s boom cities arrive by the busload to take part in a wild frenzy of dousing and dunking and drenching with 100 Dai women dressed in bright pink, yellow and blue traditional dresses  “our warmest and sweetest Dai princesses,” as an announcer calls them.

“A lot of tourists want to come see this, but it’s only a few days a year,” said Zhao Li, one of the management office employees, who are virtually all Han, the dominant ethnic group in China. “So we decided to make it every day, so everyone can experience water splashing.”