Who knew Halloween was such a Big Deal in Spain (Not I)
Halloween fell on a Monday this year which means the celebration would be the weekend right before. Normally at home, we would have had three different costumes for Thursday, Friday and Saturday night. Now, also one for work. I was experiencing so much FOMO as I watched my friend from home's Snapchats and looked at pictures on Instagram. I was missing out on how much of a big deal Halloween is back home. I heard that kids do go Trick or Treating here and adults dress up but I didn't see much of it all weekend.
Oh boy, was I pleasantly surprised! One of my roommates and I bought face paint to paint sugar skulls, or the Day of the Dead, on ourselves but I came back from Ultimate Frisbee practice late (details in another post) and I was scared to be the only ones dressed up so we opted to just going out in normal clothes. We got played because we were probably the only ones NOT dressed up and people went all out for it.
We went to a friend's Halloween party and I was forced to draw a on my face since I was not in the spirit, especially being American. As you can see on the main cover picture, we just drew with black and white face paint something really simple but it did the trick. Now we were actually part of the festivities.
However, it wasn't until we walked into the center where all the bars and clubs were that we saw how MASSIVE this holiday was here. I was taken back by everyone's costumes and make-up. They really put in a lot of effort! I guess it didn't hurt that the day after, November 1st, is a national holiday and almost everyone had work off. So they really didn't have an excuse to not go out. I have never seen this many people in Malaga before. The streets were swarmed with people and all the clubs were packed. Here's an example but I think last night had at least 5 times more people, especially later in the night when clubs opened:
I lucked out that Halloween fell on a Monday this year because it was my day off. I was finally able to experience a night out in Malaga! I was craving it so badly. We tried to meet up with our friends after the party and that took awhile but when we finally did, we were able to get into two big clubs for free - Sala Gold and White. They were both so packed! It was pretty hard to move around and dancing but still a really good time. After I went back to my friend's hostel and hungout there for a bit. I got home around 6:30am then slept until about 3pm, which is a normal sleep cycle for me anyway.
All in all, it was a very successful Halloween and I was very pleasantly surprised by how big it was here!
