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Anastasia Preobrazhenskaya
BOO-O-! Hallow's Eve is getting sooner! [0] - 23.01.2025
As mega popular as Christmas, as spooky as nothing else on the Earth, what it may be? Halloween of course! One week is left for making ready witch costumes carving poor Lack-o-Lanterns. Halloween, this word feels to us so familiar and almost homely. But did you get to know how has everything started?Ancient people of the British isles marked that night as the one when the boundary between the world of alive and the world of dead was lost. According to the Celtic believes the dead relatives came to the houses of their families to sit by the fire. That’s why all the doors and the windows must be shut before the sunset on the Hallow’s Eve. However, don’t forget to put some treats for the dead outside your the house!
Probably, this very tradition finally resulted in the popular children Halloween game “trik or trak”. This old phrase is translated as “treat or trick”, which, in America in particular, means: Give me something tasty or I’ll wind all your bushes with the toilet paper! As nasty as it may seem, however, this trick is still very popular with little Americans! Children love and adore this holiday because they are allowed a lot on this very day.
Besides Jack-o-Lanterns and nasty but funny tricks, the indispensable attribute of Halloween is fire. Any kind of fire, starting with fire place and coming to energy-efficient lamps, must be lit on in the house during all the night for no wicked spirits to come inside. Many years ago the fire which had gone out on the Hallow’s Eve was the sign of something bad happened in that house.
The tradition of making spooky costumes also came from the depths of centuries. Celts used to dress up in animal skins as scary as possible. By doing that they hoped to frighten away the spirits which had crossed the boundary between the two worlds.
Nowadays this holiday is widely known all over the world. In Germany for example the Frankenstein’s castle in Darmstadt attracts thousands of people dressed as all kinds of monster. The locals believe that on this night the ghost of the owner of the castle may be seen on the roof.
In France impressive parades take place near Paris and Limoges. Only there you can see the whole parades of goblins, vampires and spirits and taste the real “witch dishes” in local pubs and cafes.
For Chinese the Halloween in known as Teng Chieh – the day of remembering the dead relatives. The paper boats are made which will be burnt in this night to help the spirits of dead reach the heavens.
There are hundreds of international believes connected with this holiday. According to one of them you may meet a real witch! At 12 o’clock on Hallow's Eve put all your clothes backwards, place yourself on the crossroads of two roads and walk backwards. Good luck!
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