It’s October and you are fantasizing about your Halloween party. It’s a new festival in India that we graciously copied from the West. We have seen it in the movies and tv shows. We all thirst to go to the parties shown on tv and dress up with cool costumes but one weird look from the watchman and you are duly reminded this is India. I believe most of us want to relieve our fancy dress competition days? Some are creative but I am disappointed to say the rest are generic.
- Darken nose with mascara
- Add whiskers with mascara
- Wear all black
- Wear cat ears?
- Or just wear devil horns and call it a night
Come on guys we are better than that. Before we once again copy blindly from the west let me shower you with some knowledge on the Origins Of The Scary Fancy Dress for the qUirKy kids with popping Instagram feeds.
I will divide this into 2 parts
- How it originally started
It dates back to the Celts, who lived two thousand years ago in modern day UK, Ireland and France. They celebrated their new years on November 1st and called it Samhain. For them, it was the end of sunny summers and the start of dark wintery winters. Winter was coming. As winters were harsh, it was often associated with death, that is why the Celts believed the night before November 1st was when the dead were most active on earth. The line between living and dead were blurred. To avoid all that jazz they built huge bonfires and sacrificed a bunch of stuff to their gods to help protect them. Also, they wore animal heads and skins as costumes. Before bats rebranded themselves to associate with Corona, they were most popular for batman and halloween. The huge bonfires attracted bugs and the bugs attracted the bats. Mystery solved.
A few thousand years after that, one thousand to be specific Christianity was trending. It was receiving the most likes, comments and shares. But they wanted to be featured on the explore page, in fact, they wanted a spooky costume party of their own. So they came up with All Soul’s Day which was to be celebrated by big bonfires, parades and dressing up as saints, angels and devils to honour the dead. They decided to celebrate this on November 1. Talk about copying. All saints day was also called All-Hallows and the night before was All-Hallows Eve and eventually Halloween. Tada.
- Halloween In America
So during the great potato famine in Ireland, a bunch of them migrated to America for a better life. And as we have all experienced a game of chinese whispers, they changed how halloween was celebrated. Tbh, I liked their version better. During halloween, the kids would play “tricks” on their neighbours. They wore a mask to protect their identities. Those “tricks” turned to vandalism pretty fast. So storekeepers and homeowners began giving “treats” as a bribe to be spared from their “tricks”. Hence trick or treat. Tada. To put it bluntly, it was basically extortion.
As years passed Halloweens PR team made it into a family friendly diabeitic holiday, much to the enjoyment of candy makers. 25% of the annual candy sold in the USA is for Halloween. In fact, Halloween is the second most commercialized holiday, right after Christmas. People now spend on costumes for their pets too, here look at them, it’s cute.
I like how halloween originally started and where it is now. I am looking forward to seeing what India does with it and if it will be a fully welcomed holiday. My time has gone but if the stars align the future kids of India have a buttload of candy written in their fortune. I just hope they are the good ones.
P.S. – please show creativity in costumes.
My dreams are big. My mistakes? Bigger.
