Okay, I haven't done a blog in a few days and yesterday was Halloween so I'm gonna do a blog all about Halloween.
Like all holidays there's always what it is about and what people do to celebrate that almost never seems to directly correlate.
"Halloween".
This celebration, originally a celtic festival celebrated on the 31st of October called Samhin (pronounced sow-in) was one where people would light candles and ward off ghosts.
The confusion comes about when when then also there was All Saints Eve which was celebrated on the same night, October 31st.
All Saints Eve, was a celebration observed the day before a Western Christian (the Latin church, Protestantism and independent Catholism) feast called All Hallow's Day.
It marks the beginning of AllHallowtide, a 3 day observarance of the dead, these including martyrs, saints and faithful departed Christians.
And like most practices, over time, the 2 events celebrated or practiced on the same day, become melded together with the passing of time. Especially seeing that the habits of Christianity had spread to most of the Celtic lands. The Celtics probably intergrated the two seeing as they were the ones to be led onto the activities of the Christians.
The day following All Saints Eve, All Souls Day, was then celebrated similarly to Samhain, with big bonfires, parades, and dressing up in costumes as saints, angels and devils. Slowly it began to make a transition from being called All-Hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween...
Wow, that was messy.
Anyway,
From what I understand however, is that this was removed from the Catholic Church in 1955 but can still be seen celebrated by some Anglicans. But as many "Christian" holidays go.... Non-christians participate in it as well.
Halloween, being predominantly of the Europeans, was only really practiced in colonial New England.
It was only when the European ethnic groups then melded with the American Indians that then a distinctive "American" Halloween was developed.
Which then brings us to the habit of trick or treating.
As America should know, but I think they don't tend to acknowledge is that their country is BASED ON IMMIGRANTS.... So. In the 19th century there was an influx of Irish coming into America. (Irish Potato Famine, de people dem was running, refugee crisis, yes history repeats itself) This is what then popularized the celebration of Halloween in the US.
Borrowing from the melded English and Irish habits, the Americans then began dressing up and going door to door asking for food and money, "treats", and the ladies believed that they could "land a bae" by performances with mirrors, yarn and apples etc, hence the "trick".
In the late 1800s to 1900s, there was a move in America with Halloween being more about community and neighborly get-togethers than about the ghosts, ghosts stories, pranks and witchcraft.
The tricks became pranks and the treats became candy.
Halloween parties for both children and adults became the most common way to celebrate the day. Parties focused on games, foods of the season and festive costumes. Parents were then urged by newspapers to select less frightening costumes for the sake of the children.. (Oh dear! For the children!!) And for that reason, alot of the superstitious qualities of Halloween diminished and people started dressing like storybook characters, and now in the 21st Century, like TV and Movie characters, memes etc.
Alright Alright...
As we know, being in the Caribbean and pulling alot of our social media content, food and even newer habits from America and Europe, it's no surprise that here in Barbados people even participate in Halloween activities.
We're like hey! That looks like fun. Let's dress up and Caribbean people can't pass up a party.
Costume and dress up parties and fetes, Haunted Houses and even little Trick or treating parties.. and some of us really just be dressing up for Instagram, we ain't really going nowhere. Don't lie. It's really anybody's decision on what Halloween is or means to them.
So in my celebration of Halloween, here are my favorite costumes, I've been seeing on my social media. (because I love a good dress up)
Today the quote for this blog is simple "Boo!!!"
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Thanks and catch up in the next blog!
Ciao!
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