Hey everyone and welcome back to the Understandable English Podcast.
I hope you've all been very well this week.
To start with, I just want to say that, from now on, I will be uploading a new episode of the podcast every Tuesday.
I have chosen Tuesday because I have the whole day free to make the podcast and to edit the audio quality and make sure it is really good for you.
So please remember, every tuesday a new episode of the podcast will be released.
The second bit of news is that I've made a YouTube channel.
I have not yet uploaded any videos, but I am currently thinking of many ideas.
The link is in the description of this podcast, so please click the link and subscribe to the new YouTube channel.
That way you won't miss any new videos coming out soon.
I would love to hear your suggestions for brand new videos and ideas.
I can make videos about Edinburgh and life in the UK, and I can do them in English with English subtitles.
So today's topic.
Today's topic is Halloween.
Halloween.
Halloween is a celebration that is very popular in the West.
It is something that I noticed isn't very popular in Russia.
It hasn't quite become a holiday yet.
So today I would like to talk about what Halloween is and what it is like in the UK.
Often when people think of Halloween, they think of the US sort of films, US culture, and this idea of lots of pumpkins, trick-or-treating, children dressing up.
But first, how did Halloween actually start?
I did a little research, a little searching online to find out.
So it turns out that Halloween was originally an event celebrated or carried out by a group of people called the Celts.
So, who are the Celts?
The Celts were a group of people, a nation that lived across Ireland, Britain and Northern France.
They existed until about 2000 years ago.
They believed that on October 31st, which is Halloween, that the ghosts of the dead, the ghosts of dead people, came alive and haunted the land.
They terrorised, they made people scared and did awful things on October 31st.
So, to prevent this, the Celts made massive bonfires.
A bonfire is a large stack of wood.
A large pile of wood.
This large pile of wood or stack of wood is then lit on fire.
They burnt it.
They believed that by doing this they scared the ghosts away.
They scared the evil spirits away.
They also had a lot of different traditions and games.
Many of you may know the Roman Empire.
Well, when the Roman Empire invaded Britain, They actually kept some of these old traditions and it became a part of the culture.
One of these traditions, which we still actually do today, especially children at Halloween, is called bobbing for apples bobbing for apples bobbing for apples is a game in which you fill a large bucket of water and in it you place a bunch of apples The apples float in the water.
Children then put their head in the water and try to bite the apples, to lift the apples with their teeth from the water.
I remember doing this as a child as well.
Speaking of apples, another common thing at Halloween in the UK is to cover apples in toffee or chocolate.
This is simply just an apple with a layer of chocolate or toffee around the outside.
It is a sweet treat that many children enjoy at Halloween.
Now, children also often have Halloween parties.
They meet up and they play these games as well as dressing up as monsters or superheroes or really anything they want and, of course, one of the most exciting fun bits is called trick or treating.
Trick or treat children dress up, like i said, as monsters or superheroes or something fun.
They then go from house to house, they walk up to houses, they knock on the door or they ring the doorbell.
When the person comes to the door, they open it and the children shout.
The person who owns the house or that lives there then gives the children candy or sweets, as we say in the UK, and the children leave and go to the next house.
It's a lot of fun and children love this little game, I guess you could call it.
So, how popular is Halloween in the UK?
Well...
I would say that it is not as popular as in the United States of America.
And actually because of American films and TV, Halloween has become much more popular in the UK over time.
For example, people didn't really used to trick or treat in the UK.
But during the 90s, so until the 2000s, and really during the last 20 years as well, it has become a lot more popular.
I remember when I was a child, I used to trick or treat sometimes.
My parents would let me dress up as a vampire or some other kind of monster, and we would go together and ask for sweets.
I honestly thought it was a lot of fun.
I also used to go to a Halloween party with all of the other kids in my class.
Everyone dressed up.
We all played bobbing for apples.
We told ghost stories, so stories about ghosts.
And then we went trick or treating.
These memories are really sweet and a lot of fun.
But one thing I would say is that as people get older, Halloween changes.
When you become a teenager and then become a student, Halloween here becomes something very different.
It almost becomes a drinking holiday.
Students often dress up in Halloween costumes, so like monsters or superheroes or movie stars.
They then get together, have a big party and just drink lots of alcohol and have fun, I guess.
This is something that was very popular here at university.
So I guess you could say that as people get older, Halloween becomes less about the games and traditions and it becomes more about just drinking and partying here in the UK.
One other thing I should mention is that pumpkins are very popular in the UK at Halloween.
A pumpkin is this big orange fruit or vegetable.
I can't really remember if it's a fruit or a vegetable.
But anyway, it's like a big orange spherical vegetable fruit thing.
And what people like to do is they like to take a knife and carve a face.
So they make a face with a knife on the pumpkin.
They then take the insides out of the pumpkin, so all of the soft stuff inside the pumpkin.
They take it out and then put a candle inside.
This candle has a small fire, a small flame, and it makes the pumpkin glow.
I really like these decorations.
I think they look very cool and it's a lot of fun to make your pumpkin look the way you want.
This is something I actually still did when I was in Russia.
I went and I bought a pumpkin.
I think in Russian it's called Tikva.
I made a face and I put it in my apartment.
But I did really notice that Halloween hasn't yet become a big holiday in Russia.
What do you think about this?
Do you think that it is becoming more popular?
Do you think it will become more popular in the future?
Or is it just a way for businesses and advertisers to make more money?
In the UK, Halloween is a very commercial holiday.
Lots of companies, food brands, services they all make Halloween advertisements or Halloween themed products.
This is definitely just to make more money.
So, to them, it's a really good thing that Halloween is becoming more and more popular.
It is a chance to make more money.
But, to be honest, Christmas is exactly the same.
Christmas is a huge commercial holiday.
Do you think that this ruins the holiday?
I would be curious to understand and hear your opinion.
I hope that this was interesting for you.
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Thank you all so much for listening.
I appreciate your support, all of the messages and all of the wonderful comments on my Instagram.
And I hope to see you here next Tuesday in the new podcast episode.
Have a wonderful, fantastic day.
Goodbye, everyone.
