Happy Halloween!

I know it's technically not Halloween yet but it's Japan and no one knows when Halloween is anyway. I miss Halloween parties. Crazy costumes, walking around the town, fun cakes and treats.

A friend was having a little Halloween party for her students and I went to help out. The nostalgia of carving pumpkins . . . I had the kids make monster balloons and ghosts out of lollipops and tissue. Then made them put their hands into paper bags to guess what was inside. Most of the bags had simple stuff like pens, rubber bands, and bananas. I thought I could gross them out with a tupperware full of pasta and a little oil to make them slippery like worms, and another had a peeled grape. I thought the grape would feel like an eyeball or some kind of animal guts and gross them out, but they smelled their fingers right after touching it and realized what it was. Too bad.

We went trick or treating to a few houses that my friend had set up beforehand. She got friends in the neighborhood to prepare snacks for the kids when we stopped by. The kids knew that costumes were mandatory but some came in their regular clothes, so she ripped holes in garbage bags and told them to wear those. I guess it was a humiliation tactic so they'd come in costumes next year? When we were about to leave a couple kids looked like they weren't going to wear their garbage bags and she threatened them with, "If you don't wear those bags you know what's gonna happen, don't you." I guess the threat worked 'cause they wore those garbage bags. It's not the Halloween back home, but it was enough of the Halloween spirit to put me in a good mood.

Oh the days. Back in St. Louis I went to a party dressed up like Little Red Riding Hood and passed out lollipops from my wicker basket. Most people didn't know I was a guy. I guess they thought I was a really ugly Mexican girl.