Halloween

Sorry we've been a little MIA from the blogging world for the past few weeks. Things have been borderline ridiculously busy here between Spiritual Emphasis Week, the end of the first academic quarter, sports games/practices, and preparations for the Association of Christian Schools International Accreditation review (VCS is going through the re-accreditation process with ACSI).

But, I knew we had to at least get ONE post in during October, so what better day to do it than Halloween? Strangely, Halloween isn't really all that big of a deal here. In fact, when I asked one of our Austrians about it I was told that the holiday wasn't really celebrated at all 20+ years ago. This is one of many cultural differences we experience this time of year. The weirdest is not having Thanksgiving, which is arguably my favorite holiday of the year.

Anyway, instead of celebrating Halloween, Austrians celebrate tomorrow's "All Saints Day," which is recognized as a national holiday. I remember getting caught off guard by this holiday last year, as all the stores were closed and we needed to get groceries. We're marginally wiser this year, and will make sure we have enough rations stored to sustain ourselves over the weekend since stores are all closed on Sundays here as well.

So, from what I know of "All Saints Day," folks here celebrate by lighting candles and visiting the graves of deceased relatives. Personally, I think I prefer Halloween's take on celebrating (eating loads of candy and caramel apples), but maybe that's me being "culturally insensitive," which, by the way, just might be one of my areas of giftedness. I'll have to read back through Paul's writings to see if I can catch a reference to that one somewhere...

That's all for now. Happy Halloween!