How To Describe Help The Halloween Party
In the 1970s and 1980s I have spent the odd Halloween in England. Even more than Paddy’s Day you felt quite special - because Halloween didn’t exist in any real shape, much less a ghosty one, in England.
Halloween was ours, an ugly mess of an Irish holiday that wasn’t a holiday. And so much of our night was buried in ancient traditions that were long distorted that it was almost impossible to describe and make any sense.
As England’s children now maraud around doing damage because they take the Trick or Treat thing literally, I find it all very funny how quickly it copied another nation to add this date to its calendar.
And since it chose to copy another country I’m glad that it ignored us, ironically on its doorstep, and instead opted to ape America based on what it thought it saw in film and television.
Of course the thing that Americans call Trick or Treating isn’t what we called it. The other day I was in a group who were discussing what the verb was to describe what we did in those pre-candy days. Of course candy wasn’t part of our vocabulary either; it was sweets that we weren’t getting at doors.
We all know we said “Help the Halloween Party”, and we all know that we all did it, but what was the verb?
Briefly it occurred to me that wouldn’t it be fantastic if we didn’t have a verb for it, not officially anyway, that it was just something we did.
I racked my brain and tried to remember the words we used.
-Are you going out?
-Are you going around the houses?
Maybe we really didn’t have a term for it, even though we did it.
And I had a stronger memory. It may well not have been official. And you may not have used it, but my memories became dominated by one word. Collecting.
-Are you going collecting?
I could be very wrong. Memories are strange that way. What phrase did you use in the 1970s - or earlier?
So Much More About Halloween:
• Hallowe’en in Ireland: A Quiz
• How Do You Pronounce Samhain?
• Profiling Halloween
• Do You Have Halloween in Ireland?
Eolaí gan Fhéile:
There never was a verb for it as far as I remember.(am actually a bit steamed at the moment though so don’t hold me to that)
I do remember us roving around in loose mobs,knocking on doors and wheedling out an “Anything for Hallowe’eeeeeeen”
We might get some monkey nuts and an apple if we were lucky.
A fong up the hole if not.
Grew up in Walkinstown in the 60’s. “Collecting” and “help the Halloween party did it for me”.
What happened to the bonfires and the burning of the witch. And toffee apples. And those cardboard masks which went gooey around the mouthal area, gooey gorilla masks.
Good one Eolaí.
We called it “going out with the Púca”.
We sang at the door rather than knock to announce ourselves. We’d be invited into the kitchen and asked for a second song. Then the householders would “try” guess who we were, but never get it right. Sweets for the younger kids, coins for the older.
Those who didn’t welcome the Púca suffered having their gate tied up with barbedwire or other “punishment”, as was only right. Meas mór ar an Phúca.
Devin - An apple if you were lucky, yes, but did you ever get the golden ticket that was the rarely spotted wineapple. Oh how special that was.
Sniffle - the bonfires aren’t as haphazard now it seems, but it could just be where we’re both living. The fire brigade in Dublin had a record year last year of 1,600 calls on Halloween. You should make cardboard masks, gooey ones of course, but you should really make them.
Primal - coins? What were you getting - florins? And sweets? Sweets were only starting to break into our world of nuts as I was growing out of going out. But you got no more of them than you did pieces of fruit. The Púca has a lot to answer for.
All I remember is that we didn’t carve pumpkins, we carved carved turnips and bloody hard it was too. Ever tried to hollow out a turnip? Don’t.
PCB - I’ve carved just 2 turnips in my time, and I don’t expect to ever do a 3rd. They were the original Jack O’Lanterns but were quickly replaced in the US by pumpkins because of the ease of working with their orange cousin.
Unlike the pumpkin, the hollowing out of the turnip is not a scraping out affair and takes forever, the smaller size not making it any easier - and then you start the slow carving. Yep, only for the dedicated.
Next year I’m doing a potato - I think I’ll call it a Jacquet Potato (see what I did there?)
“Apples or nuts?” we asked. With no implied threats.
I blame the Great Pumpkin.
The Halloween you see in the movies is nothing like real Halloween in the US. I collected candy in a pillowcase generally. It wasn’t that commercial in the US either back in the 70’s either.
Now only the gay parades are really any fun on Halloween - it’s a very grown up thing sans candy. More booze.
It’s late - sorry about that second either.
Having your hands tied behind your back while your head was dunked into a basin of water supposedly trying to bite an apple - ah the memories … or was that the Guilford Four?
Conan - You say there was no implied threats, but surely as the night went on and not an orange in your bag, your tone adopted a hint of menace?
Susan - You’re right - there is a danger in associating differences with location when the passing of time can be an explanation. Ireland’s Halloween has evolved - since long before the US existed of course and like most things is quite commercial though still different and more chaotic than its American cousin.
The one in England which has only been adopted in recent years is quite funny - because it ignores the traditions that informed Halloween in Ireland and in Scotland and apes a mish mash of popular culture mostly from the US - which yes is about as accurate at representing true Halloween there as Star Wars represents space travel.
I’ll confess to never having attended a gay Halloween parade when I lived in the US, but then I was probably paraded out. (Ha Ha!)
Quickroute - Shouldn’t the dunking have been voluntary? Your Halloween sounds like Halloween at Abu Ghraib.
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I was never allowed to “go round the houses” - sure we have enough nuts here for a party. Instead my Dad & I would walk the bonfires
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Any ould nuts and apples for the Halloween party was our refrain. Goin round the houses we called it.