A Very Korean Halloween!

This past weekend my host family and I held a Halloween party for the kids, their friends and the local ETAs. It was sure to be a great party, considering we have been talking about it and "planning" for at least a month. I told my host mother that we could eat American food that I would prepare. I thought that this gesture would take the pressure off of her and assure that we would not be eating squid for lunch.

I wanted to include Hee Won and Sungchan, my host brother and sister, in on the preparations. HeeWon helped to make ants on a log. The whole family watched. They tasted celery and said it was their first time. My host mother said we looked funny making it. I told her that minus the raisins that celery and peanut butter is a pretty typical snack that you could find in America. Despite my efforts, I think that dried squid will still top her snack list.

We also made dirt dessert, with mashed cookies and candy worms. Unfortunately I could not find a supermarket in town with pudding. I had to buy yogurt a lot of Hershey's chocolate syrup to create a proper pudding taste. I would say that it turned out pretty tasty.

The festivities began with getting dressed in costumes and my friend Julie applying makeup to the zombies and my host father who wanted to be a dog.

We headed outside where we walked up to a small opening on the mountain behind our house. We put out the pumpkins to carve and each adult took charge of a pumpkin or two. The children were amused for a few minutes, but like typical American kids they spent more time having sword fights than they did helping to carve. My friends were already complaining about the situation like a group of jaded mothers. The children came back to help with the final stages of the pumpkin carving and were really excited to have completed their first jack-o-lanterns.

Next, we played a version of bobbing for apples. I read about this game online. First, you poke a hole through an apple and slip a string through. Metal chopsticks worked great for this. Then you hang two apples next to each other and the participants have to see who can get a bite out of the apple first. It was a challenging game, but it was really fun for both the players and the spectators. We all looked a little silly trying to hard to bite an apple, but it was much better than having our faces in water on a chilly day.

Following a group picture we headed inside for our "American" food. Elijah had stayed inside to prepare the food (I was sad that she didn't join us) and everything was all set out when we returned. We had yam pizza, boiled yams, yam salad, lettuce salad, ants on a log, and dirt dessert. It was a wonderful meal.

I cannot forget to mention that when we returned home we put the pumpkins in the foyer. In our home this is also the place where we have one of our statues of the holy family. Our new jack-o-lanterns were appropriately placed right alongside the statue.

The kids left for church shortly after we returned home and the big kids stayed home to hang out together. My host father accidentally went to church with a dog face still painted on and I secretly thought it was hilarious. We enjoyed some blue jeju soju (my new favorite kind) and spent the rest of our night singing karaoke at the local norebang.