[VipInoLo]

Well Halloween has not hit Australia yet to any significant degree, probably due to the fact English is now a second language to the majority of the population.

[sarasaraseda]

Just back from Halloween in Vegas! I was reuniting with two Belgian friends from high school and they were the ones to choose Vegas for their first Halloween. I only followed along. What a fun place that is to celebrate Halloween. Everyone was dressed up and we all walked around taking pictures of each other.

There was an incredibly realistic Michael Jackson who posed with everyone and copied his exact mannerisms. There was a bald man with a screwdriver through his head...it looked so real. I was a tattooed lady (not much of a stretch) and my friend's wife was a witch. My friend is a bit shy...or perhaps "too cool for school" and wore a T-shirt that simply read: "This is my costume".

[fetesiceWaist]

Thought I would share this photo I processed for Halloween (original pic taken in Bangkok)



Lend me your ear while I call you a fool.
You were kissed by a witch one night in the wood,
and later insisted your feelings were true.
The witch's promise was coming,
believing he listened while laughing you flew.

Leaves falling red, yellow, brown, all are the same,
and the love you have found lay outside in the rain.
Washed clean by the water but nursing its pain.
The witch's promise was coming, and you're looking
elsewhere for your own selfish gain.............

[Ian Anderson, Jethro Tull 1969]

[jessyhalm]

Language
Only English - 15,581,333 people
Italian - 316,895 people
Greek - 252,226 people
Cantonese - 244,553 people.

They are all second languages to the natives!

[VipInoLo]

Paul what is australias first or official language now. sorry but i have to ask.

Broken English, due to the fact most Australian born citizens learnt there English from there ethnic relatives who never mixed out side there own ethnic community and could only speak in Broken English, so there kids now speak Broken English as there first or second language with English not being spoken what so ever. Personally I'm in the rare minority where English is my first Language and Broken English which I can also speak fluently is my second language.

[UvgpXK0J]

Nice cool festival to celebrate. but i doesn't celebrate due to my work, in fact i will choose to celebrate loy krathong instead if i have the chance...

[jessyhalm]

Here in Wales it only seems to have been around in the last 10 years or so.

It's new to me too.

Here's a little bit more on the subject of the origin of Halloween/Samhain that might be of interest to some.

"Samhain marks the change from summer into winter and was a time when beasts were slaughtered, if they could not be kept alive during the hard winter months. This festival is now associated with Hallowe'en or All Saints' Day, since it was also concerned with the rites of the dead. It was a feast of peace and friendship, when warriors sheathed their swords."

"In the ancient Celtic calendar, the year began at Samhain. This winter's Eve, called in Welsh, Nos Galan gaeaf and Oidche Shamhain or Là Shamhna in Irish and Scottish gaelic, now known as Samhain. This day marks the beginning of the cold part of the year, when the declining light is very noticeable. Samhain was the Celtic festival of the dead, celebrated with ceremonial bonfires. By burning effigy of the sorrows and terrors of the past year, the people got rid of the old and brought in the new.

To the ancient Celts this day was also a time of amnesty and free passage. At Tara, the royal center of Ireland, Samhain was celebrated by a festival that lasted for seven days.The actual feast day was in the middle of the week.

Because it is the change of the year, Samhain is an 'eerie' time when the worlds of the living and the dead come together for a brief moment. Here, the division between the worlds of the living and the dead is thin, and the Christianized festival of Samhain, Hallowe'en, is a time when demons, evil spirits, witches and ghosts are believed to be abroad. As the Christian festival of All Saints' and All Souls' Days, it is a time when the souls of the departed are honoured. In Scotland and Wales in former times, it was a traditional to light a samhnag bonfire on Winter's Eve, though the custom has now been assimilated with Bonfire Night (Guy Fawkes' Night, November 5th).

Because Winter's Eve is a time when the normal rules do not apply, it is traditional to appear in weird disguise to fool the world of the dead. This includes the wearing of masks, straw and rush hats, going out with faces blackened or cross-dressing.

A cryptic old Welsh song for Nos Galan gaeaf expresses the eerie nature of this night:

'Winter's Eve, Bait the apples.
Who is coming out to play?
A white lady atop a tree,
Carving an umbrella stick.
One O'Clock, Two O'Clock,
It's time for the pigs to eat.' from The Sacred World of the Celts, Nigel Pennick.

[phsyalcvqh]

Too good not to watch again!

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ8eFCylIj0"]YouTube - Jethro Tull - Witches Promise, 1970 - The Minstrel Looks Back 2DVD[/ame]

Tried to post this yesterday but YouTube was down for maintenance.

[Hmwmzian]

Paul what is australias first or official language now. sorry but i have to ask.

[OGOGOogoloshennya]

................Keep looking, keep looking for somewhere to be,
well, you're wasting your time, they're not stupid like he is.
Meanwhile leaves are still falling, you're too blind to see.

You won't find it easy now, it's only fair.
He was willing to give to you, you didn't care.
You're waiting for more but you've already had your share.
The witch's promise is turning, so don't you wait up
for him, he's going to be late.

David

[Marinausa]

Well Halloween has not hit Australia yet to any significant degree, probably due to the fact English is now a second language to the majority of the population.

Language
Only English - 15,581,333 people
Italian - 316,895 people
Greek - 252,226 people
Cantonese - 244,553 people.

I'm not sure how english can be a second language to most of the population when 75% of them only have one language.

Paul, maybe put down your tabloid newspaper for a minute or two...

[Hmwmzian]

[fameintatenly]

According to The History Channel's web site:

". . . In the second half of the nineteenth century, America was flooded with new immigrants. These new immigrants, especially the millions of Irish fleeing Ireland's potato famine of 1846, helped to popularize the celebration of Halloween nationally. Taking from Irish and English traditions, Americans began to dress up in costumes and go house to house asking for food or money, a practice that eventually became today's 'trick or treat' tradition. . . . "

This is taken out of context. You can see the complete article at www.thehistorychannel.com Just search for 'trick or treat'.

[fameintatenly]

Believe it or not, most parents here seem to feel caught up in a commercial whirlwind when it comes to Halloween and all the holidays. If asked, I think most would say they disapprove of everything being so commercialized, but go ahead and allow themselves and their children to be sucked in.

For days now I've been hearing parents and grandparents discussing how to make Halloween fun, safe, and relatively commercial free. Many are making their own costumes. Other's join their own little groups for parties in homes or churches.

When I was little I always looked forward to Halloween when we would go to a festival at school organized by the PTA. Since my parents raised me in the waste not want not tradition, costumes were home made. I finally got tired of being dressed as a disciple (old sheet) !

When I stopped by my uncle's house a few days ago there was another visitor, a very religious man, saying it was originally satan's day. I don't get into discussions of that nature. The young lady who stays with him during the day said her son is going to be a vampire, but that her mother disapproves and wants him to be made up as a cute animal.

I probably won't have any trick or treaters since I'm a bit off the beaten path, maybe just children or grandchildren of friends coming to show off their costumes. I don't buy candy becuase it would have to be something I like and we all know how that would end. Nibble, nibble, nibble . . .

I have two decorations, one being the little witch doll which is currently my avatar. (No, it's not my photograph - I don't have curly hair) She is sitting on a little wooden bench by my front door. When you squeeze her hand she recites "double, double toil and trouble . . . ". I enjoy sharing her with kids. My other item of Halloween decor is a pumpkin, which we will eat next week.

[Acrogeokickic]

Wiki...

I don't believe that one. Because it was the 1970s when every kid where I was in County Durham knew about "trick or treat".

[phsyalcvqh]

well if commercial hype was reason enough to chuck things, then out would be Christmas, Easter, songkran, loy krathong, love, and a couple of other nice things.

Up to about 30 years ago, Halloween was hardly acknowledged in the UK.
Then the shops imported it from the USA wholesale -children's costumes, toys and sweets-more expense for parents and profits for the shops.
Trick or treating started -which immediately became an excuse for yobbish behaviour-eggs thrown at front doors, cars vandalised and fireworks put through letter boxes if people refuse to give sweets-or more often the demanded money-or answer the door (even if out and the lights have been left on for security purposes.)

Christmas and Easter were and are never like that-and at least they are traditional!

[OGOGOogoloshennya]

To quote from Wiki:

Before the 1980s, the North American phrase "trick-or-treat" was little known in the UK and when introduced was often regarded as an unusual and even unwelcome import, because "trick or treat" isn't a tradition, with Halloween an authentically ancient festival, about the links between life and death, the struggle between light and dark. Since the 80s it has become more widespread, but is still often viewed as an exotic and unwelcome commercialised import, referred to as "the Japanese knotweed of festivals" and "Making demands with menaces". David

[chuecaloversvvp]

discussion was started here: http://www.thailandqa.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32169

well if commercial hype was reason enough to chuck things, then out would be Christmas, Easter, songkran, loy krathong, love, and a couple of other nice things.
I was a witch too! (if anyone wants to see, check out my profile in a little while.) I wish she had been here with us for the day, we had lots of activities and we plundered all the office staff as well as colleagues.

[OGOGOogoloshennya]

I don't believe that one. Because it was the 1970s when every kid where I was in County Durham knew about "trick or treat".

Here in Wales it only seems to have been around in the last 10 years or so.

David

[chuecaloversvvp]

> The other problem in the UK is that people seem unable to keep these events to the proper day.
I used to have a friend whom lived in Toxteth (the 'rough' area of Liverpool) and at this time of year she had to nail her letterbox closed.


in Hungary, noone has that one of those letterboxes, anywhere, for about 20 or 30 years there was too much crap being thrown in .

don't tell me about keeping events on their proper day loy krathong is starting tomorrow but the firecrackers have been going on and on for more than a week, sometimes until midnight. it is ok for three days a year, but it is so scary when someone hurls one into my back yard (all concrete) (no malice intended I think, at least).

and then of course, Christmas - back home they tend to start right after the day of the dead. they did start before but there was such a huge public outcry about the Christmas tree in front of IKEA on October 28th or something like that that I think they have eventually stopped. not sure though.