I wish I was one of those people who stayed attractive even when fat. Curves in the right places, a tiny face. But nope. We’re talking Judy Ann at her worst. And it sucks.
It sucks when Halloween comes around. On one of the very rare instances when wearing costumes in public is socially acceptable, sometimes it feels like the go-to costume is a variation on a sexy professional. Sexy nurse. Sexy firefighter. Sexy maid. Sexy nun. Sexy zombie. It wouldn’t do to just be professional, it has to be sexy because it isn’t Halloween unless your butt cheeks are hanging out.
Hallow – J.K. Rowling aside – means holy, and the hallow in Halloween has long passed its sell-by date. There’s nothing sacred about running around in stilettos, wearing thigh-high fishnets and a sexy nun costume, but hey we’re only young once. I’m not hating. Between you and me, that Halloween would totally be my Halloween if I weighed at least twenty pounds less and had a waist. Alas, some things aren’t meant to be.
Halloween means you get to go to work dressed as something without anyone giving you the side-eye and if I couldn’t be a sexy zombie, I was going to go the opposite direction and wear something completely asexual and shapeless. Work can sometimes feel like being in a penal colony and the costume doesn’t require toned thighs and abs, so I donned a shapeless orange jumpsuit, wore fake prison tats and secured a ball and chain around an ankle. This apparently made an impact, because the next year they decided to have a theme, and the theme was… you guessed it. Jail. Everyone went as an inmate.
The prison theme is an unwitting favourite of mine. I once spent the night at the HI Ottawa Jail Hostel. The former Carleton County Jail, once considered a model penitentiary in the 1800s, they’d conscripted the cells into really cozy little rooms with bunk beds, which I thought was a hoot and a half.
They were nice enough to include a guided tour of the jail for the guests the next day, leading us to the top floor – which had been Death Row – showing us the gallows with the working trapdoor, taking us all the way to the basement to solitary. I later found out that apparitions sometimes appear at the foot of guest’s beds, that the courtyard was an unmarked grave site, and that there have been reports of lonely cries echoing through the dorms. All I’d wanted was to say I got to spend the night in jail, and unwittingly ended up in a building ranked just behind Chernobyl on the list of the world’s scariest places. The trick to trying the unknown? Don’t research too hard.
Dressing up, trick-or-treating and hoarding bags of candy is awesome, but I still prefer the way we Filipinos celebrate the dead. Picnics at the cemetery, One Sweet Day on repeat, the party taken straight to where our loved ones are interred? It’s awesome. Plus, we get a bit judgy.
“That headstone has weeds. No one’s come to visit.”
“Oh look, those lanterns still have price tags from Robinson’s Handyman.”
Then everyone goes back to communal eating, drinking, singing really bad karaoke and playing mahjongg o and whatnot. The whole thing is macabre, hilarious, bittersweet and a great way to celebrate the dead. Free candy and exposed butt cheeks are fun, but the Day of the Dead is about focusing on the ones we love who’ve since departed and in my opinion, the way we do it is still the best.
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Author’s Twitter: @nikkajow