ktravula - a travelogue! » Halloween

Sunset

Kola — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 17:29:40 +0000

Glen Carbon, Halloween.

My Dashiki Halloween

Kola — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 12:12:32 +0000

Last year Halloween, I missed my chance to dress up as a Pirate of the Caribbean. This year, to redeem myself, I came up with a variety of costume ideas. At first I thought that I could be Robert Mugabe, the Zimbabwean dictator. I gave that up when I realized that I’d need to wear a three piece suit to be close. Then I wanted to be the stupid Nigerian Underwear bomber from last year. To do that, I might need to wear a t-shirt (and maybe a fiery underwear) and look silly. No way. Then I thought I could be Kunta Kinte. Who cares, I thought. Halloween is such a day for the ridiculous anyway. However, Kunta was a short man, and I’d have to look and behave really angrily. I gave that up as well. Then I said I’d be Fela the musician. Then I realized that no one around here really knows who he was to be able to correctly identify me. Then I said maybe I should be Eddie Long. Oh no, I said again. I’m not that desperate to be ridiculous, so I jettisoned that too. I decided to go as myself, in a classy Yoruba dashiki vest.

Nothing more needs to be said except that it was thick enough to keep the cold out when I’m outside, and colourful enough to be a Halloween costume in America. When I was asked who I was supposed to be, I said I was an African president from the Congo – not minding that the clothing material is not even worn in the Congo. When I went to the parade at downtown Edwardsville yesterday, I wore it again, and I got a few interesting glances. It’s Halloween, geddit? Let’s see what happens when I wear it to the department sometime. A student from Ghana saw me and said it is called fugu in Ghana, and is worn mostly by the Hausas in the Northern part of the country. All I know is that Wole Soyinka wore it on top of an “English” dress to accept his Nobel Prize in 1986 in Stockholm. Now it all makes sense. The cold in that part of the world is beyond belief.

And so it ends, another season of fun and festivities.

______

Random: I think it’s unfair that most of America’s fun places are in Missouri rather than in Illinois. Sometimes last week, I went to Grant’s Farm – a spacious fenced plantation ground belonging to the former general and president Ulysses Grant, also in Missouri. The grounds of the farm – now populated with animals of different kinds – was where the president spent much of his time during the civil war and the Mexican war. The state has so much more than has been presently discovered, and I’d be glad to check out as many more as I can discover.

Halloween and all that Jazz

Kola — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 10:48:51 +0000

The parade at downtown Edwardsville yesterday night was a jamboree. As early as six o’ clock in a car driving towards the venue of the annual Halloween rally, I had wondered if all of America had decided to converge here after all. The traffic was long, some roads had been closed, there were policemen at every junction, and all visible parking lots were already filled up. On roadsides were people in different costumes in family-size groups. On another side were tents and sheds, and people preparing for the parade.

I eventually made it to a safe place to park, and headed out to the road to await the start of the parade. It was cold, very cold. (You don’t have to take my word for it. I’m Nigerian. But remember that by this time last year, I’d already bought gloves.) Between six thirty and six forty-five the first group marched by. They were a band of firefighters from the city with musical instruments and a matching costume. They were followed by a bunch of school children also in costumes, and musical instruments. It soon became clear that the parade was going to follow a similar pattern. From then until about eight thirty when I have had enough, there were trains of people, cars, politicians, little children and uniformed employees who had come out to celebrate the season the way they’d done so for years.

There was plenty sweets (or candy) to go around, as any of the kids on the side of the roads watching the parade and catching them as they are flung would admit. Maybe for them, it would be enough to justify their coming out in such a cold weather. On the other hand, maybe it’s not that cold or the event would have taken place in the early fall or summer. But then, doesn’t the Mardi Gras take place in February when it’s the coldest? The other way to look at it is that this is one time during the year when whole families come out for a common purpose that is neither political nor polarizing. I saw three year olds, and I saw seventy-year olds, and a town suddenly made alive in a hopeful celebration of optimism and the fact that life always goes on.

I’m glad I went. I was a good chance to breath the fresh air of the outdoors, though I’d have preferred if it was just a little less cold.

From Halloween

Kola — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:04:07 +0000

The Halloween weekend went without incident, mostly because I later found out that it was seen mostly as a holiday for children and not for serious adults. I noticed this kind of indifference early enough in my apartment from my flatmates who had promised not to leave the front light on – a sign for the roaming kids that the house was closed for trick-or-treating. On Friday, I had gone into town late in the evening with a friend, and noticed how creatively many houses decorated their front porches with skeletons, ghouls and other scary stuff, including carved pumpkins with lights in them. There were kids on the road going to different houses in little plastic bags searching for candy. On their heels were parents and older ones who, as I was told, were there to keep their wards/siblings safe from prowling pranksters or children kidnappers. According to my friend, it wasn’t always like this. “Growing up in the 70s, there was not much in the news about kidnappings and the likes like we have today, and it wasn’t because the country was any safer, but because the news circuit was not as paranoid.” She said. “We went out at night trick-or-treating, and came back at dawn, alone and without our parents, and it was much more fun.”

At her own house, where she lives with her mother, a professor from the University, the front porch light was also turned off, and the only glow outside were two carved lighted pumpkins. We rang the doorbell and she went to hide behind one of the shrubs while I put up the shrillest imitation of children as soon as her mother approached the door from inside the house, and said “trick-or-treat!” If she was amused by our prank as soon as she opened the door, I couldn’t notice it as much as I saw her urgency to return to the basement where she was working on the computer. In short, I could say that for many people with even a modicum of maturity, especially those without preteen children, Halloween has become nothing but just a weekend of lights and irritating kids.

On Saturday was the Halloween parade at downtown Edwardsville, arguably the biggest celebration for the day. According to legend, it features a parade of the craziest costumes in the area. I had put the parade in my plans since earlier in the week, but when the time came, nature played it tricks-or-treat on my ailing flesh. I did not treat myself to a good sleep for hours preceding the parade, and my body tricked me into sleep. But wait, that was not why I didn’t go. Here is a better excuse: It was cold, and I couldn’t ride downtown in the inclement weather. Ben could have driven us there, Mafoya and I (who had made the plan together), but Ben himself was at St. Louis at the time, so we had no choice but to stay indoors and wait for news from those who went.

In the end, the news wasn’t so enticing anyway. The parade started late, the costumes were not so spectacular, and it was too dark to take good pictures. So there. The only pictures I will boast of from the All Saints Weekend were the ones I took some days before then, while messing around with an old mask. And of course with the large witch hat that I tried on while at Prof Rudy’s house on Sunday. His wife had worn it in the house during their bridge-playing session, and was gracious enough to lend me for a few seconds photo opportunity. She looked better in it though, and I wish I could put up her picture instead of mine. But without her permission, how could I? I think the main reason why I didn’t eventually dress up as a Pirate of the Carribbean was because I didn’t do my shopping early enough. And by the time I got to Khol’s on Friday, all they had were children’s costumes, and the workers looked at me strangely when I asked them if they had anything for adults to wear on Halloween. Oh well, I’m not a kid anymore. Or am I?

10 Reasons Why I DON’T Miss Home

Kola — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 06:00:36 +0000

This is the flip side of the monthly argument that started here. I suggest that you read it first.

10. Food. When you think about it, there is really nothing so spectacular about Nigerian food that one can’t do without it for a year. Yea, you can call it a case of sour grapes conditioned by inevitability, but this is my story and I’m sticking to it. Give me panini with potato pudding and chicken sauce. On a more serious note, the American continent is filled with a diverse list of amazing cuisines, and I’m glad to share in them.

9. Books. I like the ease with which I can buy books here. It doesn’t make me a fan of paper books over electronic ones, but there are so many paperbacks that are always keepsake materials.

8. People. There is something beautiful in being able to maintain a personal space, individuality, and not worry about a certain crowdiness that is characteristics of so many streets I know. It is a sense of violation from the piercing stares of strangers. I have not had much of that here. There is no pressure to speak to anyone one meets on the road, or share a bus stop with.

7. NEPA. No further comments. #lightupNigeria.

6. Mosquitoes.

5. Family. So many people have gone to great lengths to make me feel so much at home here, and I will definitely miss their warmth and support when it’s time for me to say goodbye.

4. Love. No comments. See #5 above.

3. New Experiences. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine, Winter, Spring, Kwanzaa, Martin Luther King’s Birthday… etc. There are definitely many things to look forward to.

2. Friends. See 5 above. Plus, it seems that I am closer to many of my Nigerian friends now than when I was back home.

1. Well, it’s called a “home”, not a “house”. Home is in the heart, and it goes where the heart is.

PS: Much of this list is tongue-in-cheek anyway. Next month, I’ll tell you a few hostile experiences that I’ve had in Edwardsville that reminded me of how similar people are all over the world, both in goodness and in not-so-goodness. Happy Halloween. See you in November.

(Picture credits: The Cougar Lake “Lantern”, taken from a photo exhibition of sights of SIUE.)

Itinerary

Kola — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 07:00:00 +0000

Monday, October 26th 2009:

In-class movie Thunderbolt by Mainframe, featuring Uche Obi-Osotule, Larinde Akinleye, Akinwumi Isola, Buki Ajayi and Lanre Balogun.

Tuesday, October 27th 2009:

Classworks, projects, assignments, a few other boring stuff.

Wednesday, October 28th 2009:

In-class movie Thunderbolt, cont’d.
A little fun after linguistics class, maybe on the bowling alley.

Thursday, October 29th 2009:

Same as Tuesday
Plus perhaps an attempt to make a perfect costume.
And maybe some basketball if the weather permits it.
Catch up on the many abandoned editing, writing and reading assignments.

Friday, October 30th: Open

Saturday, October 31st: Halloween

Quote for the week:

“Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I said nothing.” – Robert Benchley

Pumpkin

Kola — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 04:47:14 +0000

I was once presented by a doting love with a list of several endearment terms from which to choose a specific one for future continuous use. After about a few days of serious thinking I came back with a preferred choice, and she looked at me long and hard, hissed aloud, then wondered aloud why of all the thousand and one “nice and lovely” possible names to choose from – like ‘darling,’ ‘dear,’ ‘love,’ ‘honey’ etc – I had chosen “pumpkin”. To her very bewildered self, this terrible mis-choice only meant one thing: a confirmation of what she had probably long suspected: that I had finally lost all my romantic sensibilities. To me however, it was a very unique expression of my kind of doting which was not meant to conform to popular expectation. Needless to say, the arguments that ensued afterwards ensured that it was not one of the best nights of my romantic life!

Now in Edwardsville, everywhere I look, there are pumpkins on the front porches as symbols of the Halloween season, and almost every American house seems to want to outdo the other in the number of large pink pumpkins placed outside the house and the gardens, each with different artistic designs of scary faces. One could be forgiven to think that the Halloween fairy would be coming down very soon, and would not likely enter the home of the families without those Halloween themed pumpkin plants outiside. Now here’s another startling travula discovery: the pumpkin is the North American distant relative of the Nigerian (water) melon, take it from me. I don’t think we have these kind of large pink plants in West Africa, but we sure do have the melon, and the large water melon, as their distant relatives. And even though we don’t get to have as much artistic fun as do the American families, they always make interesting additions to our eclectic diets. The pumpkin is a very lovely plant, and very adorable too, which is mostly used for decoration but is also often eaten. But if you grew up in Nigeria too, without ever having seen or held one, you might be forgiven for picking a lousy fight over such plant as choice for a love totem. “Honey” always sounds better, notwithstanding the most improbable image of its production process intruding on the imagination, and of bees as anything but synonymous with “endearing”. The first and last time I rode out of my apartment wearing my nice-smelling perfume, I had a dozen of tenacious hungry bees competing for my attention, running with the same demon-speed of my bicycle until I got to the University and finally escaped into the security of the lounge area just to avoid their sting.

It was therefore a mild surprise, on getting back to my apartment this evening, to find that our names on the door have been re-written on pumpkin-themed pink cards by some strange fairies within the University Students Housing system. How very sweet! I can now be sure that whenever the Halloween fairy finally comes by, he’d be sure to knock on our door sometime in the night, even though our own pumpkins plants are just a few inches large.

It was just some time ago last week, when my friend in Edwardsville – the artist – had a wonderful idea: we would sneak around into backyard farms of large and ripe pumpkins plants in town to steal as many as we could so as to decorate our respective houses for Halloween. The thrill of the game, according to her, is to get as many as possible while avoiding getting shot by the farm owners who, living within the compound of the pumpkin farm, might have been immediately alerted by their pets, and who would definitely find us fair game and – needless to say – good target practice materials. Luckily for me, I was quite sober when this divine initiative came to her, so I wasn’t remotely capable of needling it on beyond the realm of just a plain interesting idea that will never ever fly as long as I’m still black, and my good mother at home still goes to her church four to five times a week! By now, you’d have noticed that in spite of my thirst for adventure, I still retain a profound love for (my) life. And despite my present reluctance to commit to this tempting escapade, I still haven’t ruled out showing up on Halloween as a Pirate of the Carribean. It will be up to me to have to live with the shame of parading myself as a pirate even though I lack the guts to do the brave things that the pirates do. Oh well, I will survive THAT one!

Halloween is Coming!

Kola — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 07:07:07 +0000

Where I come from, there is no Halloween. We have masquerades. My last memorable trip to my grandfather’s village in Ogun state Nigeria was when I was barely a teenager. It was a festive period, and it always came with a carnival of masques, mostly manned by youths of around and a little above my age. Many of the masquerades there always went with whips and canes sometimes to scare, and sometimes as a ritual part of the carnival experience.

There is one particular carnival outing of masquerades that involves whipping. Young men with long vine whips lashing at themselves in the spirit of the festival. It was always something fun to see, and to participate it, unless of course you’re being whipped, and that can be guaranteed by a mere possession of a whip. The masks are colourful and deep vessels of Yoruba spirituality and fun. A Nigerian musician Lagbaja must have had the cultural import of the mask in mind when he adopted the masquerade as his stage persona.

Now here in America where the word masquerade doesn’t mean much beyond fanciful images in children’s toy stories, there is Halloween – a playful celebration with almost similarly religious overtone. It takes place on the last day of October, featuring the scariest and (for women) sluttiest constumes, I’ve been told. It’s activities also includes “ghost tours, bonfires, costume parties, visiting haunted attractions, carving jack-o’-lanterns, pranking people, reading scary stories, and watching horror movies.” (Wikipedia). This could as well be one of the most fun events of my journey. But who knows? Like most kids growing up, I’ve always fancied a time of unmoderated delinquency in festivals and open outdoor activities. Maybe this is it. It will be something trying to figure out the right pranks to play on all my flatmates when the time comes. That will be fun. I’ve also never totally figured out the idea behind that scary looking pumpkin with a face carved out of it, glowing in the dark, so there is plenty for me to learn here, definitely.

The second dilemma is finding out the right costumes. But before you suggest it, please note that I will not be making up as President Obama. Besides the problem of finding the right ear size, I am taller than him, and I’ve been told that many people might end up wearing the same costume, so there goes my brilliant ideas. It would definitely not be fun to be one of many people having the same face in a Halloween party, would it? On the other hand, I could dress as Nigeria’s president. The problem with that is one, that nobody would know who I’m dressed as, and two, that even if they do, they might not find it funny or innovative. I won’t be dressing as the great Pharaoh either because that mask on my face in the picture above is now far, far away from my present location. As soon as the the picture was taken, back in Providence many moons ago, I promptly handed it back to the Egyptian woman who brought it, and went my way.

So what/who is it going to be? Perhaps time will tell.

ktravula - a travelogue! » Halloween

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