Halloween is mostly a non-event in Japan. There are children's parties at whatever English school they goto (if they goto one), and some foreigners and 外国憧れ日本人 goto lame foreigner clubs to drink. That's about it.

I've been reading that the Christmas-like sense of commercial, superficial appropriation (ie just add orange and black and some traditional monsters to packages to sell more products) is strong, but that Halloween is becoming more and more popular in Japan (thought I haven't seen anything but single subjective 'Halloween is becoming more popular' statements). That Kawasaki Halloween parade apparently has 2-3k people participating and thousands more watching? I wonder if the summer-centric haunted house themes flair up around Halloween now too (like that haunted hospital that's really long?).

I haven't seen much about pedestrian participation in the costumes and candy, but I'm getting the impression that's relegated to city/club-goers. Well frankly, trick-or-treating seems like mostly a suburban thing in America anyway, so that particular tradition was never all that universal. ;p

PS - Is there a name/word for those school traditions where couples go on some kind of scary walk as part of a dare to bless their relationship? (Or did I just make most of that up. I probably got a detail or two wrong, but do you know what I'm talking about?)

Last edited by ruiner (2009 November 03, 11:47 am)

肝試し?