Halloween is a lively festival that takes place every October in many countries around the world. It usually includes extremely attractive games and mysterious customs.

And now, let’s join with us to discover more about this unique festival.

1. What is Halloween? Where is Halloween held?

Halloween is held from the evening of October 31 until 12 pm. According to Wikipedia, mass in Christianity is preached on Allhallowmas Day – October 31. The night before the “All Saints” day called “All Hallows Eve” or “Halloween”. In there, the meaning of the word “Hallow” is Holy and Halloween is the abbreviation of  “All halows’ Evenin”, that is “sacred evening “.

Previously, Halloween was only held annually in Catholic Western countries, mainly in the United States. Hitherto, this festival has become a cultural event for all countries in the world, including Vietnam. In these days, the participants decorate spooky mannequins and disguise dramatic costumes.

2. The origin

Originating from the Catholic church, Halloween is the remnant of the All Hallow Eve festival – a ceremonial held before November 1. In the 5th century BC, at Celtic (Ireland), when the harvest ended on October 31, they called the planting ceremony (Samhain). Additionally, they also celebrated the New Year festival on the same time. By this time, the summer and spring deities had retreated and left a ruling position for the god of death. Therefore, on November 1, the spirits of the dead rose, and they returned to this free world to ask for food and drink from relatives.

Even on the Samhain day, the soul of the dead in the previous year will look for another body to start a new life in the following year. And to prevent this, on October 31 the villagers put out the fire in house to make the house cold and tedious. Then they disguised themselves as vampires and quietly walked around the neighbor’s house to drive away the ghosts looking for bodies.

3. The meaning

Although Halloween is known as the feast of the devil, it is not synonymous with honoring the devil. The main purpose of this festival is to educate people. Because if looking at another aspect, “demons” are tricks, threats to society that people have to stay away from them. In addition, people need to have compassion, charity, not selfishness, greed. Also do not absolutely play with the devil.

In terms of humanism, Halloween is an occasion which the two worlds of Yin and Yang reunite in immense happiness. It is also a chance for the living to remember the dead.

4. Some activities usually take place on Halloween

Masquerade Festival: This is the most popular custom on Halloween. On this day, adults and children can disguise as witches, demons or famous cartoon characters. Everything will show the unexpected creativity of human.

Decorating pumpkin lanterns: According to Irish people, the image of pumpkin in Halloween represents the famous Jack, who is addicted to alcohol and cunning. Then when he died, he could not come to paradise or hell. He just wandered around the land of the living and heated by the pumpkin lanterns.

Trick – or – Treat: According to the origin of the Halloween festival, on the night of October 31, children will hold lanterns to knock on the doors of houses and ask for candy. As the name of the game, there will have two choices. “Trick” means the tricking with the naughty games like small demons and “Treat” means the treating of the house owner by giving candies and fruits.

Snapping apple: When the Romans conquered the Celtic people, many Roman customs also entered into Celtic land. It includes the festival of worshiping the goddess Ponoma – the God who often lurks in fruits basket. The apple is a sacred fruit that used to worship genies, hence, many games related to this fruit also appear in the “sacred evening”.

5. Traditional food for Halloween day

Pumpkin soup: Apart from the soup, people also process pumpkin into sponge cakes, pumpkin pies. Pumpkin lanterns are the symbol of Halloween and the soup made from this ingredient is also an essential dish in the last days of October.

Apple candy: One of the customs of Halloween is distributing candy to children. Thus, candy becomes an indispensable item in the ghost festival, especially children also love apple candy.

Soul cake: People usually use this food a lot during Halloween night. Soulmass-cake originated from British customs. Everybody believe that when souls wake up and walk around the earth on October 31, if they eat these cakes, they will not harm to humans. The traditional soul cake is the cookie with raisins that arrange into a cross shape on the surface of the cake.

Barmbrack cake: Barmbrack is a traditional cake for Halloween festivals. Usually, people use peel and dry fruits as the main ingredients. A special feature of barmbrack is that it always hides objects containing the predictive future. The three items mixed together with the barnbrack filling. There are a coin, a piece of cloth and a ring. The coin is a symbol of the luck for money, the piece of cloth symbolizes the financial hardship and the ring brings predictions about the love of the person who receives it.

Colcannon: Colcannon is a traditional mashed potato that is indispensable on Halloween day of Irish and many countries around the world. The main ingredients of this cake are potatoes, kale or cabbage, salt, pepper.

Hopefully, the interesting information above will help you understand more about the festival that many people around the world welcome.