Celebrating Halloween in Germany

Been thinking, Halloween is coming up. Since this is my first Halloween in Germany. What do like people here in Germany usually do?
I am too old to go trick or treating (at least by normal sober standards). My plans at home have always been the same, go to a party, get drunk and then complain or laugh at other people’s costumes! And claim that my costume is so much more superior.

Anyhow, am I on the same wavelength, with most TTers? Do people even through H parties here? Or is it only something for the kiddies here?

Forget Halloween, that's sounds like an average Friday night in town.

Ausguyregensburg, type Halloween into the search box and revive one of the many recent and not-so-recent threads on the subject. Read first, post later.

Yeah that’s true, I guess the r other threads on subject, ohh well just felt like blabbing on about Halloween.

Halloween is basically unknown here despite attempts by the media/sales people to import it.

...and thank god they havent had much success!

There's a big Halloween party around Darmstadt.

The germans are clearly more fired up about Halloween than the brits who, as you can see, hate it

because the Germans will use any excuse for a piss up

Here is a few picks in the spirit of Halloween!

Call a costume-themed piss up a "Halloween party" and it's all for shit. But call it a "fancy dress party" and it's all okay again!!

I used to think "fancy dress" was the same as black-tie.

Anyway, what the Bavarians have done for Halloween for yonks is to go out and get drunk. The next day's always a holiday.

In Munich, it's kind of fun to hang out on the U-Bahn or incoming S-Bahns and have a look at the extremely self-conscious teenies in what passes for a costume.

snob

This is so obviously what those kids do: call up some friends and agree to meet at some teenie nightclub which is throwing a Halloween party. They will all go "in costume." But they don't trust each other to actually get dressed up, so they put on a hat or pin on a tail or something else minimal that they can ditch in case nobody else is in costume.

This thread highlighted a generation gap between myself and younger Australians. I was born in 69, and for me and my friends Halloween is an American thing that did not exist in Australia when we were kids. It has only become an event in Australia as the pop-cultural influence of the US on Australia has increased in recent years, and as a variety of companies have pushed its introduction in order to sell more of their shite.

Ah, back when I was a kid and everything was right with the world and we all rode Speedwell bikes to the local milk bar for some chips wrapped in newspaper and a bag of mixed lollies ... Best sign off there before I start relating tales of how we used to walk 8 miles to school barefoot and had to hurry home after school was finished to help with the shearing etc. etc.

I used to go out in a long red dress and devil horns, carrying an apple with which to tempt boys. A simple costume, but it made me quite popular.

One year I was at some bar when Jesus walked in, complete with crown of thorns and cardboard cross. I was busily tempting him in great delight at the serendipity of the occasion, only to be unceremoniously dragged back (by my hair, the bitch!) by his girlfriend, who appeared to be dressed as a denizen of the short bus (unless she wasn't in costume, and it's possible).

No German Halloween is going to beat the time Jesus and Satan got thrown out of a bar for being involved in a fight with a fat schoolgirl.

What can I say it’s hard to resist the consumerism in our society.

A good hobo outfit always worked for me. It reminds people to help the needy

nothing beats H-Ween in San Francisco, where it's for the adults... now THAT is a party! And the costumes are unbelievable!! Most are very X-rated.

Ging ich einst zur Donau hin
da war ein grosser Strudel drin
Da warf ich einen apfel rein
Jetzt muss' ein Apfelstrudel sein

Halloween is for little kids or for big kids with small minds

a look at the German wikipedia article on Halloween will give you a list of similar German traditions. The one I grew up with was this one: Rübengeistern (Wikipedia) but my dad tells me it's being largely replaced by Halloween these days. shame.

Erntendank fest in my town also looks suspiciously like Halloween/Thanksgiving to me.

Expaticus' formula: [(German traditions * 0.4 + British traditions * 0.3 + Every other tradition * 0.3)]/(American-style marketing)] = American traditions.