Curious to see the differences across the countries.
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Finland. Traditionally not a thing at all but each year the commercial aspects creep in more and earlier. Nothing about them can be contextualized further than “it’s an American thing”.
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When i was a kid i had the feeling there was more children running around to get sweets too. Now not so much anymore.
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Yeah I remember dressing up as a kid and walking around the neighborhood, but that was a while ago and in a small city
Ireland and yeah it’s a big enough deal here. To be fair Halloween started here.
Lol, it’s a big, big deal. Bonfires, dress up, trick or treat was all done as kids. It’s a bit different to tv version in America, but that has crept in over time. However, it’s always been a big deal as a festival.
Food is different - monkey nuts, barn brack (sweet bread) with a fainne (ring), cloth or coin to predict the future. The púca. Fireworks. Bonfires. Public holiday. School half term. Change of seasons.
Not a big thing in Poland but it’s present. Kids have fun going around their neigbourhood after dark (smaller ones usually under their parents’ watch) hunting for candies, young-to-middle-age people get an excuse to throw a party. It’s mostly a curiosity, not something people wait the whole year for or go out of their way to decorate their house like in the US. I personally don’t enjoy dress-ups but if kids are having fun and the religious people are getting triggered because of a “western, non traditional, pagan custom”, then I’m all for it.
Kids hunting for candies and adults having an excuse to throw parties is the main reason people enjoy Halloween in the US too. Of course, the season of scary is a ton of fun too. It’s the only time of the year that everyone goes all-out with horror movies and haunted houses.
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Where are you located?
Bulgaria
In Germany it’s not a big deal. People have an excuse to get drunk at a Halloween themed party but that’s it.
Germans use anything as an excuse to get drunk 😂
They try to sell plastic garbage in stores every year and hopefully it stays a niche thing that goes away.
It’s not a thing.
The odd bar or club will have a “halloween” themed evening or something, but that’s all there is.
Some kids go from door to door. Some kindergartens celebrate Halloween. But they are a minority. This is in southern Germany.
Interesting, where do you live?
Southern Germany for two decades, Switzerland for the last couple years.
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Wdym, we still celebrate Halloween. And not just kids, there’s plenty of themed parties in uni and stuff.
We even have an infamous “journalist” smash pumpkins on live tv cause “we don’t want Halloween”
I saw some kids having themed Halloween parties, and in some small towns kids going door to door, but it’s very local, most places would not have that.
What? Florence literally has many themed parties (for adults) and it’s not dissimilar elsewhere
Good to know, next time ill go there for a party!
How do you find such a party?
I go outside, have friends, check a few pages.
There’s stuff like Sballoween for example
Hungarian here, and a lot of far-right nationalists hate it, so it de-facto became part of the counter-culture.
What’s their problem with it exactly?
They think it’s an anti-christian holiday, and thanks to recent revisionism, they now think christianity was first practiced by Magyars, thus Halloween=anti-Magyarism.
I’m getting real bored of all these people
thanks to recent revisionism, they now think christianity was first practiced by Magyars
I’d lovw to know the mental gymnastics behind this one.
Hungarian national mysticism, mostly built around the idea of that the Magyars did even less crimes in history than we often dare to admit.
Since a big issue was the genocide of pagans by Stephen I. (to the point barely anything remained of it), a large chunk of it is to rewrite the religion part of our history. Even crazier is that many of them assume we were the Huns too, and since there was some myth that Mary might have been a Hun princess, this also proves Jesus Christ was Magyar himself. It is often paired with the idea that the idea, that the Carpathians are “actually the ancient home of the Magyars, because Huns”, thus denying the genocide of Avars, displacement of Slavs (this is very important, since Slovakia’s territory used to be part of Hungary, and denying the legitimacy of a nation is a good gateway for ethnic cleansing á la Russia), etc.
Looking at historic facts and evidence selectively, misinterpreting them, ignoring anything that contradicts them. Also, just making shit up and saying it with a straight face so you don’t question them. It also helps that the time period isn’t well documented so they can just fill the gaps with fantasy.
If you don’t know much about history and don’t look into their claims at all they can be surprisingly convincing.
Also that it’s a foreign holiday that was imported to make money and taint our culture.
Some who are more into conspiracy theories also say that they want to push uniformity through American pop culture because “The Jews™” want to make a one world government and enslave everyone.
They say it’s anti-Christian because instead of practicing the Christian customs of remembering the dead and praying on this day, kids go out to party dressed as demons.
Source: my neighbor is a far right conspiracy theorist and goes on the same rant about it every year.
UK - not really. less than half the houses in my area put up any decorations/leave out a pumpkin for it. though might be because I’m in an area with a lot of old people.
still fun to see though.
I’d say far less than half based on my experience - I’ve very rarely seen people putting out a pumpkin or other Halloween decorations in their houses.
The one aspect of Halloween celebrations that I think does exist in the UK is trick-or-treating, which I did do as a kid, but even then it’s been probably over a decade since I last had a trick-or-treater knock on my door, though that may be partly a London factor.
trick or treaters in my area are mostly families going round with their kids
In (Madrid, at least) Spain, it’s a sorta huge deal in schools, with every kid under 14-15 dressing up, a lot of schools doing costume parades, and many classes giving out candy and watching movies. But outside of school, it’s all but ignored. You’ll see little kids in costumes and a few bar events, but no trick or treating and no decorations.
The much bigger day/event is carnival, for which kids wear costumes again and there’s a big parade in most cities.
In Norway and it’s definitely becoming more of a thing. Growing up I never did it, but now I run out of lollies because there’s so many kids out and about.
On the flip side, Norway does have their own Halloween style celebration where you go around dressed up and demand lollies from people door to door (julebukk - I’m not sure what the exact date for it is, and I think it varies depending on where you are, but it takes place between boxing day and up to and on new year’s Eve) which I’ve definitely noticed has been declining the last few years. Maybe kids want to celebrate Halloween more than julebukk? Probably because on Halloween you can just, show up and demand shit while on julebukk you actually have to prepare a little song and whatnot.
Shame because like, julebukk is a) actually traditional and b) has some weird ass lore behind it. Like it’s something about appeasing the Christmas goat (who may or may not be a demon saint Nicholas personally went down to hell to beat the shit out of until he agreed to help him)
Julebukk looks amazing!
It wasn’t before but it is gaining a lot of traction here in Spain.
Not a big thing here in Sweden either, although shops do their best to promote it. It gets a little mixed up with “Allahelgona” (all saints day) which is close. Halloween is on the 31st of Oct iirc, and Allahelgonahelgen is on the first Saturday after the 31st of Oct. On allahelgona you’re supposed to remember your dead, so a lot of people visit graveyards and put our candles. It’s usually very beautiful.
