Why don't you look scary?

The Spanish people are beginning to understand the concept of Halloween. Yes, they call it Halloween too. The Spaniards who are around my parents' ages do not really celebrate Halloween at all. The young children are getting more and more involved in the holiday and most of them dress up and have even started trick-or-treating in their neighborhoods. And the Spaniards who are my age understand Halloween but they did not grow up trick-or-treating or even wearing costumes. This is a somewhat recent development for them.

There is confusion with the whole costume concept. Here in Spain, Spaniards think all Halloween costumes have to be scary. They don't, as we all know. Most of the "scary" costumes and mask wearing phases of our lives ended in the early pre teenage years. So you can imagine that when the Spaniards saw an energizer bunny, a cowgirl, a pumpkin and a gothic girl walking down the street on the way to the bars, they were a little confused. I am very interested to see what Halloween will be like when the younger children are older. I predict that trick-or-treating and dressing up will be much more common in a few years.

Then there are the concepts of pumpkin picking, pumpkin carving, jack-o'-lanterns, Halloween decorations and candy corn that my students have never heard of so it was pretty fun to teach them about everything. The one thing they all found interesting and somewhat crazy is that there are Halloween stores that are only open for a few months out of the year. Looking back on that, it is a little crazy.

Ironically, my Halloween in Spain was the best Halloween I have had in a very long time. I went from not having a costume until 5 pm to running to the Chino (aka discount Chinese grocery store that has everything including rabbit ears and a puffy tail for 1,80 euros) and throwing together an outfit last minute. After, other American English professors came over along with some Spaniards to celebrate glorious Halloween in our piso. The mini fiesta en our piso turned into a night out as it normally does. We walked to the bars as I was told that my rabbit ears "were not mine" (obviously...thanks rando Spanish guy) to having a conversation with people in the bar completely decked out in rabbit garb. Let's just say a Halloween where half the people were dressed up and half of the people we looking at you like you were an insane idiot was by far one of the best ones yet.  As I fell asleep around 5:30 am (having the next day off...All Saints Day...thanks for being a Catholic Country, Spain!), I felt pretty content about my life. And when I walked into school today and told my coworkers what I was for Halloween, I started out by saying "Yo era la conjeita de..." (I was the little rabbit from...), and they all responded "de Playboy!" and I proceeded to explain that no, I was not the little rabbit from playboy but rather from the Energizer commercial. They understood, laughed, and I loved how they all knew about Playboy. Spain, I love you!