Witch ever

Last Friday, like most North American families with small kids, we celebrated Halloween.

The concept is quite new to the Dwarves as it never really took off in Switzerland. I have to admit we were boycotting it as well, as it is not one of our traditions but mainly a nice opportunity for stores to make some extra money during the quiet period between the summer and Christmas (remember, we do not celebrate Thanksgiving either, which probably makes a few millions turkeys all over Europe happy, but is definitely not good for business).

However, convincing kids they will have to dress up, wander around in the neighborhood and get to eat a lot of candy does not require any diplomatic skills. I decided I would handle that part, and next time they decide they do not want to eat a weird vegetable I just bought, the Man can take care of it. He would probably say that it has nothing to do with the vegetables themselves, but rather with my cooking abilities; however, this is another topic.

We all had a blast trick or treating, the Dwarves collected about 1.2 tons of various treats, and I am currently thinking about opening a candy store.

Most children who came to our door were cute and polite, but I have to say they were a few who did not bother to open their mouth and would just hand out their bags without a word.

I realize I am new to the game, but aren’t you supposed to say “Trick or treat!” and probably “Thank you”?

Helped by a couple of glasses of wine, I could not restrain myself from saying “Huh…what do you want? Sorry, I don’t get it” until they would finally utter the magic sentence. Those who were not thanking us would get a loud “You are welcome!”, in a vain attempt to make them feel ashamed of themselves.

Now they can say they had at least one close encounter with a witch on that night.

No trick or treating, however Carnival is celebrated in Switzerland – here in Lucerne. Photo credit Wikipedia.