halloween en madrid

  

Happy belated All Saints Day, everyone!!  Yes, you heard me correctly.  Thanks to the wonderful traditionally-Catholic country in which I live, I had yesterday off because it was All Saints Day (AKA I could go out as late as I wanted on Halloween with absolutely no repercussions whatsoever)!  Spanish holidays are great for that, since I never see them coming until I flip a week or two ahead in my planner and realize we suddenly have a random week day off.

Since every supermarket, grocery store, bank, and convenience store in the city was closed, I had plenty of time to dwell on how to present my Halloween activities to you.  First off, I would like to explain what exactly Spanish Halloween is like.  There are no trick or treaters, children in costume, post-holiday candy discounts, or groups of girls all dressed in the same theme.  It’s all doctors, nurses, devils, school girls… really anything you can imagine… covered in blood.  I even asked my roommate Bea about it; to Spaniards, Halloween is about death, which I’m guessing stems from the traditions of All Saints Day, where everyone adorns the graves of their loved ones with flowers.  It’s funny to me how the same holiday can have such a different meaning depending on the country you are in.

Besides that nice culture lesson I had (and kindly shared with all of you), I celebrated Halloween in many ways similar to my American celebrations, though a bit more tame.  I carved pumpkins with friends (it was Kathryn’s Spanish roommate’s first time!), successfully made homemade caramel corn after burning one batch of caramel, a bag of popcorn, and an oven mitt, ate pumpkin seeds, and went out dressed as a skeleton with new and old friends!  All in all, it was lots of fun, though I’m certainly already planning my three nights of costumes for celebrating my last college Halloween next year in Boston!! (Wow, that sounds a little scary!)  Hope you had a happy Halloween!

Ciao, amores:)