Fall holidays around the world
Rolling out of bed Monday morning was just like rolling out of bed any other morning. How was anyone to know it was still October and a huge international holiday? One of Utah’s largest Halloween events had already drawn in its throngs of costumed party seekers and sent them back out the doors of the Taggart Student Center again.
According to the online admissions fact sheet, there are approximately 17,000 students attending USU’s main campus.
The Howl sells typically 5-6,000 tickets. Not everyone who attends is a USU student, but the numbers still add up to an equivalent around that of a third of USU’s student population celebrating the Halloween holiday in the same manner as people all across the nation and even all across the globe.
It is probably safe to say that most USU students are too old to go from house to house begging for candy trick-or-treating, but age isn’t a deciding factor when it comes to dressing up in costume, something most of Europe and South America save for Carnival.
“In southern Mexico, it’s huge,” said Fabiola Nevarez, vice president of USU’s Latino Student Union, while discussing the encrouchment of Halloween customs celebrated in the United States.
“It doesn’t really celebrate or commemorate anything, It’s just an excuse to have fun,” Nevarez “I think the Day of the Dead is more spiritual. You are mourning for someone who has left this life.”
The traditions centered on Halloween stem from even more ancient traditions going back to the Celtic druids. Originally Nov. 1 was the new year mark.
According to www.holidayinsights.com, “all the people who died in the past year were thought to rise up and search for the passageway to the netherworld. On this night the passageway, or “veil,” between both worlds was at its thinnest. Lord Samhain would roam the earth in search of these souls to capture them and take them to his world of darkness. To this day, some people put lights in their windows to help the dead find their way and keep Lord Samhain away.”
These lights are the forerunners to our present day jack-o’-lanterns and pumpkin carving. The Irish originally carved these lanterns from turnips and potatoes. People also began dressing up in addition to carving lanterns in an extended attempt to frighten the spirits away.
The costumes and carvings seem to have outlasted their original reasoning. Trick-or-treating has followed the same transition. It also began with druids who would go to each village member collecting donations for the village Feast of the Dead.
By trick-or-treating for food to donate to the Cache Valley Food Pantry, USU’s Students Together Ending Poverty has kept a little closer to this origin than the candy-grabbing kids who keep us leaping at every ring of the doorbell.
While the dominant Halloween traditions in the United States focus on keeping spirits away, other cultures focus on the remembrance of the dead.
Nov. 1, which is All Saints’ Day and Nov. 2, All Souls’ Day, were moved from their earlier celebration around Easter by the Catholic church to counteract the pagan Halloween celebration, according to holidayinsight.com The site also said these days were created to remember and reverence every saint at once instead of individually throughout the calendar year.
In Mexico, Nov. 1 and 2 are known as Dia De Los Muertos – Day of the Dead. On these days, people spend time upkeeping gravesites of loved ones and adorning them with bright flowers like marigolds. They also place items for the deceased person’s enjoyment like cigarettes and Tequila on the grave. The goal is to attract the spirits in honor and remembrance. They also prepare a feast with the deceased person’s favorite foods and a special bread of the dead.
-michaelsharp@cc.usu.edu