My Personal History of Halloween
So there was no Halloween celebrations when I was a kid. I think I first heard of it like most people from the Peanuts short with the Great Pumpkin.
So when I was about 4 years old the demand for something like that was big enough in me (and no the kind of carnival that exists here is NO substitute for Halloween only because you can dress up for it. Get real!) that my 5th birthday party was horror themed. My parents darkened the flat we lived in, baked some spooky cakes and invited my friends to dress up. I wanted to be a mummy so the idea was to wrap me in toilet paper. That didn´t stick well enough though so I mostly walked around as someone kid in his underwear with a few pieces of TP stckinging on him. It was really far to cold in march, some of my friends found it too spooky and not everybody dressed up properly (of course one girl was a princess, what else?). But I loved it I think that is the first birthday party with friends my age that I remember.
Then five years later when I knew the exact that of Halloween I had my first party with my best friend at my place where we would eat sweets, carve a pumpkin and watch movies.
20 years ago on this day we dressed up. His mother painted are faces white and black and with blood stains so we looked like Goth Zombies. We walked around like this at night through town and were the only ones to do so (we even got heckled from a car once).
In later years we stuck to movie watching. At least two a night, with snacks and sometimes a bit of atmsophere (my friend lit a candle that looked like a zombie hand once).
In these days parties have become very common. People especially like to go to our irish pubs where they are most popular and have been for longer than anywhere else. I even saw children knock on doors and yes people usually also play a lot of pranks, throw eggs or food colouring against shopping windows. That last part is less fun.
So for a while I cared a bit less for it but then I found out that the catholic church finds it offensive and now I like it even more then ever. I also have no problem that is sort of an imported holiday since almost all of our holidays are (I mean christmas? Come on!) only because it is more recent doesn´t make it less awesome, especially since I obviously had a craving for something like it before I even knew it existed as evidenced by my themed birthday party.
I stuck with the movie tradition and will once again watch the original now 40 year old Halloween by John Carpenter tonight. And enjoy some fitting snacks with it!
Happy Halloween everybody! 
