How are you? Winter is approaching in Japan.

It was Halloween yesterday. What do you normally do on Halloween?

Halloween is a relatively new cultural event in Japan. During this period, you see a lot of pumpkin themed sweets and other goods in convenience stores, department stores and restaurants. Some stores go all the way and splash huge decorations in Halloween motif.

However, children do not participate in trick-or-treat marches or parades. It’s more common for children to receive Halloween sweets at their day care centers, pre-schools, or in their communities.

The most popular activity on Halloween is to dress up in whatever costumes you choose. You can be a famous anime character, a celebrity, a TV/movie character, etc. Anything goes! People in various costumes often gather in busy areas like Shibuya (part of Tokyo). The quality of the costumes is improving every year, and you can check out some of them by searching on the web “Shibuya on Halloween.”

Halloween in NILS is like this.

With Covid precautions, we cannot yet host a large get-together, but hopefully, we can organize a fun event next year.