Essay

The Halloween exorcise plan

By Kit Pancoast Nagamura

As the weather turns chilly and the days shorten, even in a crowded metropolis, nature's cycles are evident. There are shortening days, the turning of deciduous leaves, and the sounds of trains and traffic that seem to suddenly ride the chilled air like witch songs. In the United States, this season fills children with anticipation of Halloween.

As a child, I didn't know the origins or meaning of All Hallow's Eve, or of its Celtic roots in Samhain, a ceremony held at a time of year when dead spirits were believed to cross over into the world of the living. I never realized that innocent children wearing scary costumes were meant to chase off any wandering evil spirits and protect the neighborhood. The expression "trick or treat," I now recognize, carries a veiled, though usually idle, threat. Ply me with treats, it suggests, or you run the risk that you and your home will be visited by tricks or hauntings from the afterworld. All I thought about, bumping around in my homemade costume, was getting a big bag of treats.

After moving to Japan, I largely ignored Halloween for years, until my son turned three and suddenly I had to be the engine behind my child's encounter with western holidays and traditions. Since there was no trick-or-treating in my industrial neighborhood of Tokyo, I decided that the least I could do was carve up a jack-o'-lantern for my son. I ordered a ridiculously expensive imported orange pumpkin from a grocery store, and proceeded to plunge my arms into its slimy pit of stringy pumpkin mush. How did my mother survive this, I wondered, flicking the flat slippery seeds all over the kitchen and hacking out an abstract smiley face on the poor squash.

Setting a candle inside and placing the lid on the natural lantern, I turned off the lights in the kitchen. The room was suffused with a gorgeous flickering amber glow that delighted my son. It was like having a gleeful harvest moon captive in our LDK.

We filled a bowl with treats, and while I sat by the pumpkin lantern, my son toddled out and offered candy to young office workers returning home in the dusk. They were, of course, puzzled and hesitant to take candy from a kid, but I explained the custom to them (and the fact that we were doing it in a backward fashion) and we continued until our bowl was empty.

Now I live in a neighborhood with more children and a fairly large foreign population eager to participate in the holiday. Word has traveled, and recently kids from all over Tokyo visit our streets on Halloween. Literally thousands show up. Some wear costumes, and some seem to think that their school uniforms are appropriately scary. But most are as innocent as I was as a child, so we frantically hand out as much candy as we can afford. It is one of those opportunities, like Japanese festivals, when cultural celebrations can bring us closer together. Surely, thanks to all the trick-or-treaters that flock to us, ours must be one of the best-exorcized neighborhoods on the planet!

Shukan ST: October 30, 2009

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