So far Halloween to me has only been watching actors on my
favourite American sitcoms enacting the festival so it was fun to be in the
thick of things this year. Halloween fever invaded the air about a month ago. It
started with pumpkins appearing on doorsteps, some just sat there proclaiming
the arrival of fall while others got creative displaying their crooked smiles,
wonky teeth and spooky eyes.
It wasn’t long before the decorations took on a more
sinister hue, zombie hands, spider webs, danger signs and RIP tombstones were
your everyday fare and quite in contrast to the festive decorations like diyas
and rangolis that I was more used to. Every day as I dropped the little one to school we played a little game where the she
pretended to save me from a multitude of disasters that could possible befall
me on our tiny half a km stretch with attacks from zombies, vampire and monsters
all thwarted by her bravery!
It wasn’t long before
the little one had a school trip where she proudly brought home a mini pumpkin of
her own and demanded that it be carved. For a novice who knows nothing there is
always YOUTUBE, thanks to a some online
research I found a DIY carving video and then promptly went from DIY to GID (Get it Done) by the more artistic husband.
Soon enough it was time to pick out a costume for the little
one, Girls get an overwhelming 5 choices at the costume store – princess, fairy,
butterfly, witch or cat. Since frugal Indian mom didn’t want to spend a whole
lot of money I went back to my saviour – social media and this time sought out another
favourite -Pinterest for ideas and chose Kitty cat. Unoriginal, but nevertheless cute and a safe
starting point for rookie Halloween mom!
I didn’t have to spend much on the costume, the face paint was my
eyeliner and she was ecstatic about her tail and cat ears.
On the big day as we stepped out to join the festivities we
saw little kids dressed in costume entering shops with their little Halloween baskets proclaiming trick or
treat to grab handfuls of candy from the shops down our street corner. Honestly
I think the scariest part of Halloween is the thought of children eating all
that sugar - truly sends chills down my spine! However all in the spirit of
horrors kiddo also experienced the thrill of getting free candy.
A few photo ops later posing with bales of hay and the
ubiquitous pumpkins we were off to NYC to see the annual Halloween parade. Parades at NYC are always crowded, and
standing at 5 feet three inches tall isn’t very conducive to getting a good
view; on the other hand being 44 inches tall you stand to get a better view
from Daddy’s shoulders. There is usually
a long wait if you want to get a good spot close enough to view the action but
as someone waiting declared there was quite a show outside as many of the
holiday revellers were in zany costumes of their own. One which particularly
caught my eye was a man in a body suit with a shower stall n curtain attached;
calmly sipping a beer (the beer was genuine!)
First came the fairies spraying their fairy dust, then the
giant skeletons which took 3 or more
people to operate, there were witches and vampires, ghouls of every sort, fake
blood pouring everywhere maleficent masks of every murderous kind.
