Halloween in Osaka

An annual tradition for the three years that I lived in Nara was to celebrate Halloween in Osaka. Coming from Australia, a country where Halloween is only a novelty celebration, this was an eye-opening experience for me, and led to situations that I scarcely could have imagined. To clarify my first point, though, my recollection is that Halloween reached its height of popularity in my childhood days, with groups of young children roaming around the neighborhood in costume, and knocking on people’s doors with the greeting “Trick or treat?” As time went by, owing mainly to child safety concerns, the frequency of these visits to my parents’ home dwindled, although the tradition hasn’t died out altogether thanks to the prevalence of adult supervision.

Basically, though, Halloween is perceived as an overseas custom in Australia. So there was certainly an element of culture shock when I learned that the community of English teachers in Nara held an annual Halloween party. Why was the party held in Osaka instead of Nara, you might ask? Well, if you’ve ever visited these respective places in the Kansai region, you will know that Nara is a sleepy, medium-sized city. Accordingly, it would not exactly have been the first place to come to mind as a venue for a Halloween party. Osaka, on the other hand, is the loud, boisterous member of the Kansai family, and the event fit the city like a glove. Each year’s party was distinct from the previous one. My strongest memory of the first year was arriving fashionably late after consuming a hearty bowl of ramen while wearing a full-length Winnie the Pooh costume, at a standing-room only ramen shop on the streets of the Namba area. The size of the party was modest, but it was an ideal introduction to Halloween as celebrated in Osaka.

The following year, the party was on a larger scale with respect to both the venue and the number of attendees. Given the cost of purchasing a costume, I chose to bring Pooh-san back for a second year. The final year was perhaps the most interesting of them all. I chose to mix things up in the costume department and wore a full-length Jack-O-Lantern costume. I had also inherited a superior camera from my father a few months earlier, so I was able to capture infinitely more detailed images of the event. Furthermore, after our own party, we adjourned to the Triangle Park area of Osaka, where all manner of bizarre costumes and characters were on full display. From locals to people from overseas, from traditional Halloween-related characters to comic book characters, it was the perfect culmination of my Halloween experience in Osaka.

Finally, it must be mentioned that, instead of wearing regular clothes on the train journey from Nara to Osaka each year and getting changed into costume at the venue, as any normal person would do, I chose to wear my costume from beginning to end. There was something oddly satisfying about attracting so much attention, although embarrassment may have been a more logical reaction.

Ming

Vocabulary

novelty (adj.) - something unusual and entertaining that is popular for a short period of time
boisterous (adj.) ? lively and noisy
adjourn to (phr. v) ? to leave one place and move to another
bizarre (adj.) ? strange and difficult to explain
culmination (n) ? the final result of a process or situation