Halloween
Halloween is a holiday celebrated on the 31st of October where people dress up in spooky costumes and go trick-or-treating for candy, go to Halloween costume parties, bob for apples, go to haunted houses, and carve pumpkins into jack-o-lanterns. Many more traditions take place on Halloween in other countries.
In Mexico, they celebrate Halloween, but they also celebrate the Day of the Dead on the 1st and 2nd of November. On this day, they welcome back the souls of the dead. In the Philippines, kids participate in Pangangaluluwâ and go house-to-house singing songs for candy. In Italy, they celebrate Halloween, All Saints Day, and All Souls Day. On All Saints Day in some parts of Italy, they carve pumpkins which is called Concas de Mortu, which means ‘heads of the dead’. On All Souls Day, Italians celebrate their loved ones who have passed away. Halloween is becoming more popular all over the world, but most countries don’t celebrate it. Only 37 countries do, with each country celebrating the holiday in different ways.
Halloween dates back to more than 2000 years ago. Samhain is a Celtic New Year’s Day that happened on the 1st of November. It was thought that demons, fairies, and spirits of the dead roamed around the Earth on this day, and that the night before, the separation between the worlds of the living and the dead was thin. On this day, people would put out gifts to win over the spirits that died in the past year.
Samhain later transformed into All Saints Day, with bonfires, costumes, and parades happening the day before with the name All Hallows Eve. This was later turned into Halloween. Over time, the day evolved into what Halloween is today, with each country having different traditions that they celebrate on the day.
Some of the traditions we take part in today on Halloween were from some of the traditions that happened hundreds of years ago. Bobbing for apples was created because during a festival at the end of October, the Romans would honour Pomona, the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona was an apple, so this is how the event started.
Did you know that:
Halloween is the second largest mainstream holiday celebrated in America?
The first Halloween parade was hosted in Ireland?
Thriller is the most played Halloween song?
This year, Halloween is being celebrated on Thursday, October 31. Will you be celebrating Halloween this year?