Halloween

Last night I hosted a Halloween party for AVF in the club's space.

Overall it went well, but about a week and a half ago, some guys announced they would have a crêpe party Thursday night for the regular weekly meeting, and there were about 20 people at that, and only 10 at my party. I think people made the effort for the crêpe party, and then decided a Halloween party the next evening was too much.

I picked up some decorations at a party store (all 30% off! which is normal since it was the last day anyone would want them) including fake cobwebs and we managed to make the place look festive for only 22€.

With the help of some Halloween websites, I prepared a number of dishes that really surprised the French: squeezed pimples (cherry tomatoes with boursin), witches eyes (green olives with pimentos), frogs eyes (litchi), Q-tips and ear wax (hot dogs and mustard), Vampire soup (tomato soup), and autopsie table punch (cranberry juice, orange juice, little bit of vodka, raspberry sorbet, and cranberry juice I froze inside a plastic glove to have a floating hand). I also made pumpkin cupcakes, but those were fairly normal.

I brought everything to do bobbing for apples, but in the end I felt like it was so unfamiliar that people wouldn't be interested in trying it.

We did end up watching Nightmare Before Christmas, and a number of people had never seen it, which turned out to be a positive. I always worry everyone will have already seen the movie I want to show and be bored by it, so it was nice to have an "old" film be new to so many people.

Once B and I got home (after cleaning up plastic plates and taking down the decorations), I mentioned that I was surprised by how surprising my Halloween party had been for people. B reminded me that France has a fairly deformed idea of what Halloween is, and basically boils it down to vampires, ghosts, monsters, and college girls who put on a purple wig and skimpy clothes and go out to bars with their friends (which we saw on our way back to the metro). A number of times during the evening people commented "Oh yeah, you know so much about Halloween! You have really creative ideas."

In the end, it was nice to do something for Halloween and be able to celebrate with a few people, but the scene in Nightmare Before Christmas with the holiday trees leading to each land dedicated to each holiday made me nostalgic for the "real" Halloween (and Thanksgiving, and Christmas, and St Patrick's day....). Maybe this year will be different, but France never seems as festive as the States. Maybe the Christmas decorations will have to go up early this year... and my Christmas music collection will be brought out (no matter what B has to say about Celine Dion or Mariah Carey's Christmas albums!)