Toronto :: Canada
Haloween appears to be a bigger deal than I thought, even for grown-ups.
Places: Toronto.
Coolest thing I did: Carved a proper haloween jack-o-lantern.
Coolest thing I didn´t know: The of Jack (he of the lantern) was originally about a squash, not a pumpkin.
So Haloween rolled around and I was a little unprepared for it to be treated like a second Christmas. The amount of effort that goes into decorations and costumes for the big night is a little worrying, but both the kids and the adults seem to have a good time. While our own efforts were a little half hearted we did decide to get a bit of good old-fashoined pumpkin carving under our belt.
Has anyone else ever actually tried to carve a pumpkin? I don't think I've even cooked something with pumpkin in it before so it was an eye opener to see just what the hell is in one of those things. After hacking a suitable lid out of the stem and ripping the hole open you're confronted with a whole load of sticky, seed ridden goo, kind of like a big orange spider's web that's been smacked with a sunflower. While the actual carving is a whole load of fun the cleaning out of the goop is tedious. A tip is don't try and scratch it out with a fork. Once you work out this is a stupid idea you also have a whole lot more work to do with the spoon, which is the proper instrument in this situation.
Still, after a bit of work we were all standing around the kitchen table beaming proudly down on our new member of the household. We tried to name it but no consensus could be reached so it was forever known as 'the pumpkin' or alternatively, 'pumpkin'. The pride lasted about as long as it took to go to the Haloween party we had been invited to that night.
Some of the pumpkins that had been carved out as decorations in shop windows and even at the party made ours look, well, a little ordinary. How long must it take to carve out "Happy Haloween" in old English on both sides of a tiny little pumpkin? Too long to bother with, even if it does look a bit cool.
The party we went to last Saturday night saw myself and Yvette don rubber masks purchased from the chemist the day before, chosen mostly to not look stupid on the streetcar on the way there and to allow beer to be drunk through the cleverly placed mouth holes. We, once again, were a little underdone compared to everyone else. The costumes were all very well done, and some were even very inventive. One of our mates went as a vending machine and even gave you stuff when you pushed her buttons (oo-eer). As the night dragged on and her responsed got slower and more erratic they placed an 'Out of Order' sign on her, which was tops. All the backpackers we know who showed up put in quite an effort we thought. That is, until the Canadians started to arrive.
The best costume of the night had to be the "Danger Will Robinson" robot from Lost in Space who had blinking lights fixed on the front of it. We all felt a little shamed by the effort (well, more drunk than shamed, but there was some shame in there) but the Canadians didn't seem to mind. I was talking to a bloke who used to live out in Sydney and knew didn't give a toss about Haloween so was surprised some of us put in the effort we did. Despite the build up of saliva and sweat in my rubber mask, I tried to keep it on in recognition of those who put in so much mroe effort than me.
Much fun had by all.
Our landlord put up a sign on the doorbells directing all the kids trick or treating to his floor, which I thought was tops, but the girls in our house decided wasn't fair. However, once the 700th (or so) kid showed up looking for sugary treats it did seem like a good idea after all. I reckon if was faced with sugar hyped kids all night I would have become a bit sick of it but the locals seem to love the whole thing. It's either that or they don't want kids throwing eggs at their houses. I heard this one story of kids filling their SuperSoakers with wee and demanding junk food or the dousing of the householder in urine would result. I'm sure that could be classed as armed robbery and get you 10 years.
So I put our now furry pumpkin out last night for the garbage man. It only took about 12 hours for it to start smelling funny and the aroma of penecilin was unmistakable when walking into the house yesterday. I'm not sure how long they are supposed to last, but it seems to be a leading factor why people display them outside their houses, not like we did.
On a side note we indulged Yvette's culinary fantasies on her last night here by going out for dinner in the poshest Tapas bar in the world, Jamie Kennedy Wine Bar. No reservations are taken so you show up, they take your mobile number and you get a call back sometime in the next hour when they have a table. We ended up with a nice little number out the back where the really expensive wines are racked (and probably rigged up to alarms). The idea is that the menu changes daily so you just have a small plate of everything and they suggest a wine to go with each one. We tried this idea at first, but it was becoming rapidly too expensive so we went for a bottle instead with our last few dishes. Duck liver, Poutine with pork belly, rare beef and mushroom gratin, it's all pretty rich stuff. I enjoyed it more than I let on, but I think the range of food is more to do with the fact that most of us are too poor to eat there more than once, so we'd best get our try of the whole range on that one visit. Still, Yvette loves all that kind of gourmet stuff so was pretty happy with the whole thing.