Anti-Halloween Parade

[Martin Hash]

While in Lima, Peru, visiting my son, Haven, and his wife, Mirian, we went shopping in the downtown market so Mirian’s sister, Ruth, could buy a Halloween costume. It was the perfect place: the streets had been closed to traffic, and most of the shops were displaying Halloween decor. However, the crowds were dense, and getting more so. In the distance I could hear a brass band playing. I maneuvered everyone to go towards it; I wanted to see what was up. I love local flavor.

It looked like the start of a parade. Hot damn, I thought, hit the jackpot of parochial celebration. But it seemed a pretty somber celebration: mostly middle-aged men in dark suits, and women carrying signs and banners which I could see as they got closer, proclaiming in Spanish, “To Christ you say yes, To Halloween say no.” People were also handing out little fliers showing you how to vote for Jesus and against Halloween.

Anti-Halloween Pamplet.jpg

“Is this an anti-Halloween parade?” I asked Haven, who lives nearby.
“Indeed it is,” he replied. “There was one like this last year in front of the San Jose church by my house but the next night there were still tons of kids trick-o-treating in the Square.”

The parade was long; hundreds, maybe thousands of marchers, dozens of vehicles, and multiple bands. Anti-Halloweenism is a big draw in Peru, but what makes it great is the irony. In a country where people bury an aborted llama fetus under their threshold to insure fertility, a angry caste of men in suits march through the downtown Market district where virtually every shop is selling childish decorations for a harmless holiday.

As with all semi-coincidences, that morning I had chosen to wear the Halloween undershirt Gwynne had made me. It was black with orange pumpkins. Once I learned what the parade was about, I unbuttoned my outer shirt to display the smiling jack-o-lanterns. Soon a Peruvian man in a suit was pointing at me, saying “Halloween.” He tried to give me a magazine with the Spanish headline, “Bad things about the Internet,” but I wouldn’t take it, shaking my head and pointing back at my shirt, explaining “yes, Halloween.”

Halloween Shirt.JPG

It went on like that for another half hour. The crowds were immense. We eventually escaped into St. Martin Square where it was relatively quiet.
“That was fabulous!” I exclaimed. “I’ve never been in an anti-Halloween riot before.”
Then my curiosity piqued, and I asked Ruth what costume she’d bought.
She said she was too intimidated to get a costume.
All she’d wanted was a pair of Mickey Mouse ears.

[DBTrek]

You’re crazy, man.
One day the headline is gonna be “Rich OWG missing after fucking with the natives one too many damn times”.

[Speaker to Animals]

The fuck? What kind of Catholics are they? That anti-Halloween stuff comes from Puritanism.

All Souls Day is a feast day.


That's a great shirt, btw.

[de officiis]

Martin, you’re now a true Halloween Hero.

[DrYouth]

This really made me LOL!

Go Marty!

Are you gonna trek to Machu Pichu?
You really should.
Also Bolivia is really cool, La Paz is incredible.

[C-Mag]

The fuck? What kind of Catholics are they? That anti-Halloween stuff comes from Puritanism.

All Souls Day is a feast day.


That's a great shirt, btw.

Look at your Pope, Christian Liberation Theology started in Latin America. Lot's of weird Catholic stuff down there.

[Ex-California]

The fuck? What kind of Catholics are they? That anti-Halloween stuff comes from Puritanism.

All Souls Day is a feast day.


That's a great shirt, btw.

Look at your Pope, Christian Liberation Theology started in Latin America. Lot's of weird Catholic stuff down there.

Goddamn Indians fucked it all up

[Speaker to Animals]

The fuck? What kind of Catholics are they? That anti-Halloween stuff comes from Puritanism.

All Souls Day is a feast day.


That's a great shirt, btw.

Look at your Pope, Christian Liberation Theology started in Latin America. Lot's of weird Catholic stuff down there.

Goddamn Indians fucked it all up

He's white, though. Argentina was majority white like the US until they opened their immigration policy in the last century. Now much of it is a third world shit hole. But the Pope himself comes from Italian immigrants.

There are still towns up in the mountains where everybody speaks German. They look like German towns.

But Buenos Aires..

[Ex-California]

Look at your Pope, Christian Liberation Theology started in Latin America. Lot's of weird Catholic stuff down there.

Goddamn Indians fucked it all up

He's white, though. Argentina was majority white like the US until they opened their immigration policy in the last century. Now much of it is a third world shit hole. But the Pope himself comes from Italian immigrants.

I meant Latin America in general

[C-Mag]

The fuck? What kind of Catholics are they? That anti-Halloween stuff comes from Puritanism.

All Souls Day is a feast day.


That's a great shirt, btw.

Look at your Pope, Christian Liberation Theology started in Latin America. Lot's of weird Catholic stuff down there.

Goddamn Indians fucked it all up

Nah, Bolivarian Socialism, I'm pretty sure the Pope subscribes to it.