HALLOWE'EN IN HAERBIN

Happy Hallowe'en from the gang at HIT, Haerbin.
We celebrated the scary event a day ahead of the rest of you. That is if you do not live west of Beijing. Hallowe'en is not celebrated in China so we had to be inventive in coming up with costumes. Nonie was a Pirate of the Haeribean and I was the better looking Hansen Brother of Slapstick fame complete with a cardboard CCM hockey stick.

Father Tom came out of the closet for the evening complete with a solid gold plastic cross and considerable amounts of Holy Beer. He blessed anything that moved and somethings that didn't. He was constantly creating full glasses of beer from empty ones. It was one miracle after another. Please note his altarboy in the background. He made sure of an ample supply of empty beer glasses for Father Tom.

Meet Takiya (Please forgive my spelling Takiya) our one and only Japanese teacher. She carved her very first pumpkin with partner Bransen. They actually were not pumpkins but with imagination and some knife work on the base they were transformed into pumpkins for the evening.

Justin was also a virgin pumpkin carver. He completely got into the obligatory gutting of the pumpkin and with little direction from us, created the friendliest pumpkin of the evening. He was unclear on the scary part of pumpkin carving.

Voila. Four magnificently carved gourds/squash/pumpkins. Three scary ones and one with a huge friendly grin. Not a bad looking bunch if I do say so myself. Congratulations to Jackie, Elle and Tyler, visitors from Mudanjiang, who won the competition for the scariest pumpkin. It is the second one from the left with the really evil grin.

It was on to a fancy hotel restaurant for a Hallowe'en feast of various dishes that I can pronounce but not spell. Much beer was drank. We were located in a small private room. Lots of Lookylou's checking us and our costumes out. We may have gotten a bit boisterous from time to time. What is it about wearing a costume that causes you to lose all inhibitions and take on a different personality?

From there on to the Skye Bar who were hosting a Hallowe'en bash. Skye is the local ex-pat hangout near HIT. It was filled with foreign teachers of a dozen nationalities. All wearing the greatest costumes. My favourite was Sonny and Cher. The guy in the Cher costume looked entirely too comfortable wearing it though. Nonie and I stayed long enough to enjoy the atmosphere then headed home and left the younguns to the parteh! Not sure how it ended as we have seen no one today.