Halloween….

Caporegime
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Boston, Lincolnshire
I don't mind it. It is nice the kids are out doing something rather than sitting Infront of a TV. I normally just get my scream mask out of the attic and a bowl of sweets. Then wait for the kids and missus to come home and take my pick of the treats :p.

When I was a kid I used to make up to £20 some nights. Especially if you knew where to knock and back in the 90's £20 wasn't bad for a night's work!
 
Soldato
OP
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Land of Gin (I wish)
Friend's dad has his birthday later this month and always get Lindor chocs. He saves the wrappers and wraps brussels sprouts in them. The kids that come to him have a bucket for sweets and just throws a couple in. Kids eat the sweets when they get home - what my friends did and their kids now plus go to numerous houses. Forget which house gave them the Lindors. He has never had repercussions from this.
 
Soldato
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2 May 2011
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Woking
I quite enjoy Halloween, it's nice to see the kids having fun.

It also brings back nice memories of my own youth when my parents would throw a big party for the kids/their parents, and even when my mother always loved seeing the kids in their costumes.
Apart from last year, for the last 10 years or so I've gotten into the habit of making up a goody bag for the kids with a variety of sweets.

It probably helps that the kids that call round in my area tend to be either neighbours of friends of neighbours and the local code is basically you only call at houses that have got decorations up, which gives me an excuse to do things like set up a bubbling cauldron and severed arm hanging out of the wheelie bin :) (I look at some of the decorations the Americans can get cheaply and easily and wish we had them over here:)).

I’m also a big fan of halloween, though not trick or treating. Nice excuse to dress up fun something funny.

I’ve also got fond memories of halloween. My birthday is in late October so I often had a Halloween themed birthday party.
 
Soldato
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7 Jul 2011
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Cambridgeshire
I love halloween around my way, quite a young neighbourhood so swarms of kids trick or treating. A few years back we had so many knocks I had to ask the wife to make dinner and I just sat on the stairs waiting for the next one for 2 hours. Everyone seems to have fun, what's not to love?

By the tone of this thread so far the general thought seems to be that children should be seen and not heard, and the prevailing reason for them not being heard is that they're down the mines where they should be, earning a crust instead of fannying around dressed like ghosts.

I suppose I should be grateful that nobody has tried to link dressing up in a costume with some insidious leftist plot to turn all kids trans though. Small blessings.
 
Soldato
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16 Aug 2009
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7,728
It didn't exist in this country when I was a child. It's a recent import that I cheerfully continue to ignore. Obtaining money by threats in the name of a tradition almost all of the participants are ignorant of and even fewer believe in. Yeah, great. Lovely idea. Sign me up for that.

It was all about guy fawkes night when I was a kid "penny for the guy!" still scratch my head over this halloween palaver the only I know about it is from watching US tv. Still not something they do in australia apparently
 
Associate
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22 May 2012
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London
Trick or treating is Irish too. It was called "guising". What the Americans did, more than anything, is immensely commercialise and localise existent traditions.

The tradition of "Guising" actually began in Scotland. Halloween in America was equally influenced by the Irish and Celtic British immigrants of the 19th century.
 
Soldato
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Bath
Halloween has always been my favourite holiday of the year. Who doesn't love getting dressed up in a costume and partying?

We don't get many kids round our area trick or treating, but we'd welcome it. It's just a bit of fun so not sure what all this complaining is about. I loved it as a kid and its a fun event for my daughter.
 
Man of Honour
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Just to the left of my PC
Really, how old are you? It most definitely existed when I was a kid, back in the 70s. It wasn't this Americanised bullflop that we have today, but Hallowe'en was most definitely a thing.

I'm 52. The day might well have been a thing back then, but it wasn't the thing it is now. Maybe the same name, but a completely different thing. Like the difference between an oxcart and an aeroplane, for example. They can both be called "transport" or "vehicle", but they're very different things. For example, there wasn't the custom of going round the streets threatening to vandalise people's homes if they didn't give you stuff. There wasn't a load of stuff made in China, shipped around the world and sold to be thrown away into landfill the day afterwards. Or shipped back to China for "recycling". I barely remember the name from my childhood. The only reason I remember it at all was that it was a relative's birthday and there was some in-family joking about that.
 
Soldato
Joined
20 May 2011
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Aberdeen, Scotland
I haven't cared much about Halloween as I got older, despite participating in trick or treating as a kid.

However, I realise from reading this thread that some of you are joyless, miserable gits.
 
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