Halloween Party!

As those of you the United Status are well aware, today, October 31, is Halloween. In Costa Rica, however, they don’t really celebrate the holiday. There are scattered people that I have met who refer to it as noche de las brujas (night of witches) but there is not nationalized celebration. And they definitely don’t trick or treat. So, I decided that, since I am and English teacher, and October is National Culture Month, I would share our Halloween customs with my 5th and 6th grade students.

We actually had a week of Halloween. We spent all of our class periods this week learning Halloween-related words, and playing games. There are now 40 students in Santa Rosa who know words like “Haunted House”, “Jack-o-Lantern”, and “Mummy”. I made BINGO cards with pictures for all of the words, and we played that to practice. I also made a Halloween word search for the kids to do, and we had a coloring contest. Then, today, as an incentive for their good behavior the past couple of weeks, we had a party, complete with balloons and prizes and everything! There were prizes for the winners of the coloring contest, and I brought candy eyeballs and Halloween lollipops, and a ton of candy. I would only give it to them, however, if they said “Trick-or-Treat” first. We also played the Mummy wrap game! (Thank you Barrera family). For those of you who may be reading this who did not grow up going to Emily and Katie Barrera’s Birthday parties, I’ll explain. The concept is fairly straightforward: in pairs, you take a roll of toilet paper and make your partner into a mummy. I had prizes for the most impressively constructed mummies. The kids went nuts with the toilet paper, but I didn’t even mind; we had a great time. The 5th graders dressed up, but the 6th graders thought that they were too cool for disfraces.

I also brought lollipops to my high school and adult classes, although we didn’t devote a whole class period to Halloween vocab or anything. They threatened to come to my house and ask for candies, and I informed them that I would have some ready. No one came, but I had some candy sitting by just in case. In the nighttime, we had a little fiesta at my house. Dixie, Veros, Nelson, Carita, and I had a Halloween pijamada (slumber party). It was very 3rd grade (with ghost stories) but there was also beer (which there wasn’t usually in the 3rd grade). I have found out (on this and other occasions) that all ticos (Costa Ricans) have a ton of ghost stories, and they always swear that they’re true. So, we sat around in my living room, and shared scary stories. I only have 1 ghost story, but it is probably the best story that I tell. Actually, I pride myself on the fact that I can relate it pretty accurately, and still retain the scariness, in Spanish. Granted, its better in English, but I’ll take what I can get. So, I told the story about how my “friends” (you know who you are) played a trick on me in high school, taking me out into the desert and scaring the life out of me. I always tell the story as it happened to me… meaning that you don’t find out it’s a joke until the end. And, in the retelling-as in real life- its f-ing terrifying. In the middle of my story Marta was outside of the house throwing something in the trashcan, and her white hair in the moonlight totally freaked Carita out; it was classic.

Between my classroom parties and my friends coming over, I managed not to miss Halloween too much, though I would be lying if I wasn’t a little bit homesick.