JAPANEXILE

Halloween isn’t normally celebrated out in Japan, its more of a Western thing, however there are still some shops that devote a little bit of shelf space to it. Anyway, its pretty much part of mine and Craig’s jobs to plan the yearly Halloween party in Toya. I don’t think I’ve actually celebrated Halloween for quite a few years, and when I did it was Dad who carved the pumpkin and thought up the games. So when it came down to it, despite the expectations of people over here, I know about as much about Halloween as they do. I sure as hell don’t know why we celebrate Halloween, thankfully no-one asked me. Although I think when I’ve finished writing this I might find out…maybe.

We had done the shopping for the party up in Sapporo, or at least we had bought the prizes for the costume contest, along with our costumes. I didn’t really know what the format of the party was going to be either, who was supplying the food etc. So we concentrated on having enough games to keep people entertained. I spent the best part of the afternoon making a giant pumpkin out of black and orange paper for the ‘pin the nose of the pumpkin’ game. Craig was keeping his ideas for the party games inexplicably quiet. But he was confident we had enough to do and everything would be fine, so, tired as I was, I believed him and went to Badminton.

Back from Badminton quickly to try my hand at carving my pumpkin, my trusty leatherman made easy work of it. Despite Craig’s protests I decided to follow a design I had seen on the internet, why reinvent the wheel? We started the party off with my game ‘pin the nose on the pumpkin’ which turned out to be ridiculously easy as everyone had a good grope before finally pinning the thing down. So we relegated my beautiful pumpkin to mere decoration, and drew a pumpkin on the white board instead. Which worked better, even if it was less aesthetically pleasing. After all that excitement we took an extended break to dig into the feast the various members of the Adult class had provided, all Japanese food, nothing remotely Halloween related. Not even a pumpkin pie, not a single sweet. Sorely disappointed!

The games continued for the next hour, first the Spider Web game, where you stand in a circle and wrap each other in string until you are completely entangled, then try to escape. which everyone managed except one kid who managed to get himself so tangled we had to cut the string off him. Secondy we went for apple bobbing, splitting the motley crew into two teams, the team who empties the bowl first obviously being the winner. Teams A (My team) destroyed the competition, mainly due to the reluctance of some of the opposition to getting their hair wet. Another apple game was next, passing it down the line only using your chin. I thought this was really easy, everyone else seemed to struggle, perhaps I have a bigger chin. It didn’t really matter in the end, most people were in histerics watching the desperate attempts to pass the apple along. My self included, only stopping so I could catch as many of them on film as possible. The final game of the evening was the mummy game, simply, mummify someone in toilet roll. Cori and I paired up with the intention of showing them how things are down, only instead Cori’s attempt at mummifying me was embarrassing. Seriously, my bra was showing through (a statement which probably needs explaining) The party was finished off by Craig, Cori and I choosing the winners of the costume contest. In 3rd place, Pirate Setsuko, 2nd place, Little Red Riding Hood Hatsumi, and in 1st place Scream! Its Namiko! Be sure to check out the photo album, things will make far more sense!

This entry was posted on Monday, November 5th, 2007 at 10:07 pm and is filed under Japan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.