Halloween is coming in one month! Yippeee!
Have I mentioned that I love Halloween?
Yep, I’m one of those idiots. Count me in!
It’s true, if you don’t warn people (or even if you do) sometimes they don’t answer the door. We’re probably not going to trick-or-treat this year.
I choose that American one, definitely the American one.
Halloween falls on a Friday this year so we will probably have a small party Saturday afternoon in the village just for us and the neighbor kids. Trick-or-treating in our neighborhood in the city has always worked out well. One neighbor in our building made a poster informing the building that we were going to be trick-or-treating and if they wanted a visit to hang a paper pumpkin on their door (paper pumpkins provided). It worked out great, and we were always sure that we weren’t bothering anybody who didn’t want to see us. In the village, we asked our immediate neighbors if they’d accept a Halloween visit at the door. Most of them invited us to come and seemed excited. They know that I’m American ,and we offered them candy for their kids and candy to give back to the trick-or-treaters…but…when it came time to actually answer the door only 2 houses answered. One family even switched off the lights after we ran the bell.
We’ve been planning out our costumes as well. Rosie is planning to be Katy Perry so basically she will dress as she normally does each day for school plus a wig and some lipstick. Lizzie is planning to be Onslow from the British comedy “Keeping up Appearances” which is her favorite television program. He looks like this -
I’m thinking – tank top, sweater vest, jeans, trucker hat, drawn on tattoos, a beer can (empty), a packet of fags (empty) and a well-rehearsed, “Oh nice!” - his catch phrase.
I’m planning to be a hipster so I just need to cuff my skinny jeans and grow a beard – maybe grab a craft beer and walk around talking about the importance of quality hops.
Misiu will be dressed in a costume which I call “SuperTrans”. He doesn’t really like that name. He’ll be Clark Kent caught in the middle of his transition to Superman, hence the name SuperTrans. At least I think I’m clever.
I’m just wondering who’s going to grow out of Halloween first, me or the kids?
7 comments:
Onslow! My favourite character :)
Love your daughter, this girl's got potential!
Ja osobiście się nie cieszę z Halloween w Polsce. Nie będę walczył z obchodzącymi tę imprezę, po prostu nie lubię zanikania polskich tradycji (nawet jeśli wiele z nich jest związanych z katolicyzmem) i wprowadzania importowanych (podobnie ma się to do języka itp.). Nie jest to w żadnym wypadku przytyk do Ciebie i Twojej rodziny - to by było niewłaściwe zarzucać Amerykanom obchodzenie Halloween. Jeśli zaś chodzi o nas to szkoda mi tej kultury, która uległa i ulega zapomnieniu, ale to po prostu nostalgia.
czar - My daughter has a very interesting taste in television viewing. She got it from her mother ;)
Me - I agree with you that Halloween in Poland as a holiday is kind of weird. It does work very well for English teachers in elementary school though. They have a cute lesson that ends in candy so everybody is happy. Hey, I had to teach about Guy Fawke's Day as a British holiday and I'm not even British. Other than that I always explain to people that we are not some yuppy show-offs but that we are American. And you are right Me, it's hard for them to say anything to Americans celebrating an American holiday. At my teenage student's school they did Dziady so not all is lost to the American Halloween. There is still hope :)
I like Halloween... in NY. otherwise, I haven't been in Poland at the end of October for many many years. this year, however, I will be there for All Saints Day and I will finally see how Poland celebrates Halloween. Personally, I think it's too close to All Saints Day and that's why it might feel kinda weird celebrating it there...
Hi Justyna - Maybe it is problematic to celebrate Halloween -a fun-filled holiday mainly for children - one day and then a solemn day of remembrance the next day. It was never a problem for me back in the day when I celebrated both of these days. I went to private Catholic school where we had to go to mass every morning at 7:00 a.m. Our priest dressed up as Dracula for Halloween each year and conducted mass in costume. Our principal, a nun, dressed up as a witch. The next 2 days after that we celebrated All Saints Day and All Souls Day. It never seemed to be a problem for us.
In Poland Halloween is mainly a holiday for English teachers and their little students at school and for bars and pubs looking for some marketing hook to catch customers the day before a national holiday. I rarely see people trick-or-treating out on the streets. Oh and the jack o'lantern has become more popular as an activity for parents and kids to do together.
Justyna, enjoy your visit and I invite to come back to KS and share your impression of how this time of the year has changed in Poland :)
Well, if we're going to talk about real Polish traditions, then we actually had something similar to Halloween. It was called Dziady. You can look it up. Very dark and spooky holiday that was replaced when the "real" Polish tradition replaced it with a ROMAN catholic holiday. ;)
Anyway, I'm super jelly, my wife is state side for Halloween this year. I'm really curious as per your kids... we're having difficult times in a small town. Moving back to a big city after two years in the sticks. Didn't really get accepted as "norm" and got tired of being the odd one out.
At my neighbor's child's school one very devout girl from the class organized an anti-Halloween campaign and then....later organized Dziady in which she dressed up in a costume which looked like a virginal character from Pan Tadeusz...covered in blood. Awesome.
We split our time between the sticks and the city so...In the city we're pretty anonymous except where the kids' school is concerned. In the sticks they have accepted all my weirdness under the guise of me being foreign, or more specifically American. It is highly unlikely that we'll ever be in the States with the kids for Halloween but it would be great to show them American Halloween...if it still exists as I remember it from my own childhood.
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