Spanish Style Halloween - Learn Spanish

Halloween has been celebrated in Spain for only a short time. True: it is not an official holiday and there are people who do not like it because of its “imported” or “disrespectful to the deceased” nature; but it is also true that it is very popular and gains more strength every year. Its acceptance has reached such a point that it is gradually being “Spanish-ized.” Why is Halloween succeeding in Spain? We will tell you some reasons: they are both philosophical and practical.

In some circles, there is talk of a kind of “historical recovery of the holiday.” It seems that in 18th-century villages in Galicia and Asturias, children could be seen carrying lamps and asking for food at the doors of houses on the eve of All Saints' Day: it is not something very well documented, but in favor of this argument, we will say that in northern Spain, the sense of belonging to the Celtic culture, from which Halloween originated, is very deeply rooted.

Others prefer to speak of that curious, distinctly Latin attitude of making jokes about death and seeing it as something not very serious. We would laugh at the fear of the Grim Reaper and, like the condemned, take advantage of the night before the day we all die a little to organize parties and, ironically, enjoy life. It is something very complicated and can be perfectly refuted by those who consider the Day of the Dead to be too serious a matter to organize a gathering in a nightclub.

More practical and surely more consistent are the arguments of some parents and teachers who see Halloween as a good substitute for Carnival for several reasons: children love to dress up, but doing so in February (when Carnivals are celebrated) means doing it in the middle of winter, with a rather annoying cold in some Spanish cities. Halloween is in October, when the temperature is not wintry and there are more hours of light (ideal for a short afternoon party in the courtyard).

There is also the fact that the following day is a holiday: one can perfectly well stay out late on the night between October 31st and November 1st and go out for drinks with friends. Even, if the calendar is favorable, one can request the 31st as a day off from work and enjoy a double holiday (yes... the famous Spanish “puentes” or long weekends).

Something very curious is that Halloween in these lands is adopting practices from other times of the year: we do not know if it is for meteorological reasons or because of the peculiar Spanish character, prone to mixing things. For example, there are cities where children do not ask for candies or sweets, but instead directly ask for the “aguinaldo” (a small amount of money), which is a Christmas tradition; and there are party venues and nightclubs that offer their clients a “cotillón” (a dance where a bag of party favors is provided) for Halloween when this custom used to be exclusively a New Year’s thing. It is even said that in some houses that night, you can find turrón instead of candies (let’s not forget that this sweet is typical of Christmas but begins to be marketed in mid-October).

Not to mention that sooner or later, at a Halloween party, you will run into someone dressed as a bullfighter. But oh well: these are things that happen and make this holiday something more familiar. Have a great Halloween... sorry... Eve of the Day of the Dead!