Friday, October 30, 2009

Trick or Treat!

Even though I didn't dress up, I did get to celebrate Halloween today. Because the holiday is associated with the English language, all of the English classes at Mar Bella go all out — and I was invited to attend. All week, the third through sixth grade classes had been learning songs in English, which they performed for the younger kids. The words were mildly inaudible, but the masks were adorable. The older kids then went trick or treating to all the younger classrooms and sang the "Trick or Treat" song, which I had taught them on Wednesday. Per the teachers' suggestion, we changed "If you don't, I don't care, I'll pull down your underwear" to "I'll put red ants in your hair." I'm not sure how much better that is, but ok!

Most of the kids go home between 1 and 3 to eat lunch, and so I am usually not at Mar Bella during those hours. Today I got to stay and eat with the teachers though, and I have to say, their cafeteria lunch trumps anything I ever saw at FA. We had lovely fresh grilled fish, a wide assortment of vegetables and potatoes, and there were at least three other things I was just to overwhelmed to try.

After lunch was the day's actual main event: the Castanyada.

The Castanyada is a Catalan holiday, celebrated on the same day as Halloween, and centered around castanyers, or chestnuts. I'm still a little fuzzy on the symbolic reasons as to why chestnuts are eaten, but the holiday is extremely festive, and involves a lot of singing and dancing.

The sixth graders dressed up as the gypsies who sell chestnuts on the streets. (I pulled out my best face painting skills to make wrinkles and mustaches.) The preschoolers performed a dance in the gym and were then given folded pieces of newspaper, containing roasted chestnuts. One of the teachers overheard me saying I had never had a chestnut before, and taught me how to properly crack and eat one. Good thing — all of the little kids then decided my nails were perfect for peeling open their treats.

After the youngest and oldest kids had their song and dance time, the entire school congregated on the playground for more dancing and chestnut eating. The first grade class — who have fully attached themselves to me — pulled me into their circle and we all danced to the Catalan castanyer songs. It was unbelievably fun, and the kids got so into it. At the end they got a little Peter Pan-esque on me — three of the first graders refused to let go of my leg and begged me to come home and be their mothers. I promised I would be back on Monday.

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