Halloween en Barcelona

No...they don't really celebrate Halloween in Spain, at least in terms of trick-or-treating...but I wanted to give the kids a taste of this American holiday (which they kind of idealize, by the way, with activities in school... books about Halloween... they've even seen The Nightmare Before Christmas! and were thrilled to find out I knew a lot of the words to "This is Halloween," which I had stuck in my head for days and days, and was continually singing in their presence). Unfortunately, Lucia and Mateo both left for the weekend to stay with friends, and were not even around on Halloween. So I decided not to plan too much, but I still wanted to do something with Simon... I'd already given the kids Halloween-decorated bags of American candy as a "welcoming" gift upon my arrival (and when I checked their rooms, they all still had candy left, amazingly)... so rather than simply buying more candy, I raised the idea of buying a pumpkin so I could show Simon how to carve a Jack-O-Lantern, and also introduce him to baked pumpkin seeds (mmmm... my favorite). Seems simple enough, right? Unfortunately, pumpkins are not that easy to find in Spain. I didn't even attempt to search for one... Marta generously offered to buy one for us. And when she finally came back Saturday night with one, she said she had to go to FIVE different stores just to find one little pumpkin! And she came back with one of the smallest pumpkins I'd ever seen... She said there'd been a much larger one, but it was around 13 Euros (which is like $20! ...for a pumpkin!) so, naturally, she opted for the teeny one instead (which only cost her around 3 Euros). In any case, it was, thankfully, large enough to carve... and actually had a fair amount of seeds (though tiny ones) as well! Simon didn't seem too excited about the carving at first (especially since he couldn't really do the carving himself, as even I was struggling not to cut my fingers off), and he was practically repulsed when I suggested that he scoop the insides out with his hands (eventually he did, but was really grossed out by the gooiness of it all). Marta looked on with interest as we struggled with our tiny pumpkin... and she also munched on the pieces that we cut out (which kind of grossed ME out a bit... then again, it's just like eating a raw vegetable I suppose, and after trying it myself, discovered it's not all that bad). Eventually, we had our Jack-O-Lantern, and it looked great! Simon got more excited once we put the candle in and he could experience the full effect, especially when Marta showed him the enlarged glow of the Jack-O-Lantern's face on the wall when we turned out the lights. And he LOVED the pumpkin seeds (in fact, he was asking for more the next day! ...not an easy request to fulfill in a country with 13 Euro pumpkins...).

After our Jack-O-Lantern was complete, Simon wanted to show it off. So we went into the hallway (a 5 ft square of a hallway...only 2 apartments are on each floor), put the glowing Jack-O-Lantern on the floor (which cast it's face on the wall with the lights off), rang the neighbor's doorbell, and ran back into our apartment, peering through the door. The neighbor (a woman in her 40s with 2 little twin daughters, about 4 years old I think), not seeing anyone through the peephole, called out "¿Quién es? (Who is it?) And Marta (in a ooooooey type voice) called out "Nooossssooooottrrrooosss" (Us). Apparently confused, the neighbor repeats, "¿Quién?" And Marta repeats, "Noooossssooootttrrrooosss." When the neighbor still didn't open the door, Marta (in her normal voice) calls out, "Tus vecinos!" (Your neighbors!). Finally, the woman opened the door, with her twin daughters in tow, and was quite surprised to see the lone little pumpkin glowing in the hallway. Then Simon, Marta and I jumped out... there were laughs... and the neighbor, in the spirit of things, went inside to find some candy to give Simon in return! I was so happy that he was able to experience a little bit of (unplanned) trick-or-treating!

At this point, he was really into the Halloween experience. So he decided to put on a Scream mask and a long black coat, and sit atop Marta's shoulders, creating a (surprisingly scary) 7-foot grim reaper-esque figure. Then the 3 of us went into the elevator and went down to the bottom floor to surprise the landlord (a friendly 50-something-yr-old man with a very nice wife). Marta and Simon stood there in their costume, holding the Jack-O-Lantern, while I turned off the lights of the "lobby," rang the doorbell, then ran to hide. The wife (because the husband wasn't home) opened the door to the "grim reaper" and Marta, again using her scary voice, said something in Spanish that I couldn't really understand, and the woman just laughed and laughed and laughed... and eventually I ran over with Simon's halloween bag so he could grab a handful of candy from her candy bowl (which, conveniently, she always has well-stocked on her coffee table for the kids in the building... in fact, Lucia and Simon take advantage of this generosity nearly every day... reminds me of the old woman who lived on Monitor Street when we were kids, and would give us candy if we knocked on her door... I loved that lady...). After Simon had his candy, and we said goodbye to the nice woman, we went back upstairs. Still in the spirit of the holiday, Marta and Simon now wanted to scare Marcos (Marta's husband), since he hadn't seen them in their costume... but the candle in the pumpkin had gone out, so she told me to run in and get the lighter before they rang the bell to our apartment. While I was in the apartment searching for the lighter, though, the nieghbor's husband was leaving his apartment, and (as I was told by Marta afterwards) this 40-something-yr-old man literally jumped with fear when he opened the door to find a tall grim reaper looming in the corner of the dark little hallway. When Marcos and I heard the ruckus in the hallway, we opened the door and saw the neighbor standing there (not looking very pleased... probably embarrassed that he, a grown man, had gotten so scared). Marta came back into the apartment cracking up... and when she told me what happened, I laughed so hard, I cried.

(Above/right: Simon posing with the tiny Jack-O-Lantern and his costume... but as a midget grim reaper rather than a 7-foot tall grim reaper... doesn't have quite the same effect, but is the only picture I have from that night).

So, needless to say, Halloween in Spain turned out to be more halloweeny than I had anticipated! And, although I know I should be experiencing the culture of Spanish holidays in all their glory... since the next holiday on the calendar is, again, American... I'm looking forward to attempting to bring a taste of Thankgiving into the Palazzi household as well (of course, ingredients for pumpkin pie, like the pumpkin alone, may be a bit difficult to find...).