Happy Halloween!

I woke up this morning fully intending to not celebrate Halloween. It was too much work; I didn't have a costume; and no one else here was really into it (least of all the Finns). So I lolled around in bed all morning, worked a little on the Finnish paper that I had to do, and put Halloween out of my mind.

And then I went outside. In a small tactical error on my part, I walked 15 minutes to Skanssi, the nearby mega-mall and home of the nearest liquor store, only to find that said store was closed. And walking around outside and in the mall I was struck by how normal everything looked. Today, October the 31st, was just another day in Finland. No last, mad rush on the bags of fun-size candy, no orange and black carpeting the department stores, and most of all, no excited little kids walking around in costume. And then I got really sad, and nostalgic, and decided that maybe it was worth celebrating Halloween in Finland. Especially since this is what the sky looked like at 5:30 pm today:



So I called up a friend, made some burritos, and set out a giant bowl of candy that we could eat while watching back-episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Low-key, but it felt good to know that I was, at least in some part, carrying on an American tradition (did I mention there was a giant bowl of candy?)

Happy Halloween, all!