What’s happy about Halloween?
I cannot remember when commercialized Halloween and Trick-or-Treating started here in the Philippines. Thanks to @momblogger for the enlightening post.
I have never donned a costume and went house-hopping asking for candies, I had only seen it done in movies. Why do people celebrate it anyway? If it’s supposed to be about the dead and scary stuff, why do people say “happy” Halloween? Having been in a Christian school, it was never encouraged. I think it also depended on my parents and the place where we lived. We didn’t belong to a village with a homeowner’s association to organize Halloween events.
Lately, even malls and hotels have Halloween activities mainly for the children. It must be fun to dress up as their favorite characters or superheroes then getting lots and lots of candies and chocolates. My eldest daughter is slowly becoming conscious of this thanks to the TV shows. I felt a twinge of guilt for not letting her dress up in a costume and go trick-or-treating (although she is not too aware that she’ll be getting candies).
I am not very fond of candies, but I love chocolate. Our house doesn’t have a staple stock of candies (who does?), therefore Elle doesn’t always ask for it. But if other people gave her some, it’s OK with me, she’s even happy and thankful for the occasional treat. For me, candies should be just that, occasional treats.
When the next Halloween rolls around, I still wouldn’t voluntarily join trick-or-treating anywhere, unless we were invited by family. Then, I’d have to come up with costumes for the kids.
