Happy Halloween!

Last night, we threw a Halloween party for our roommates and friends. They don’t celebrate Halloween in China, so we were determined to make this party a good one. We planned it for a week or so and invited more than 40 people. I think that it turned out to be a huge success!

The night began a bit behind schedule, as the hour that we had reserved to set up turned out not to be enough time to make our haunted house, let alone the fact that we ran out of garbage bags. Nevertheless, our roommates and their guests (they were allowed 2 each) showed up around 7:30, just as we told them, so about half of us Furman students worked on the haunted house while the other half entertained the guests with a welcome speech, snacks, and chit-chat.

Finally, at 8:30, we were ready to perform in our three-room haunted house, which contained mental patients, the undead, the ghosts of mass murderers, a vampire, spooky story-telling, and a chance to touch human body parts, among other things. Almost everyone who went in had never been to a haunted house before; they were really scared! (If you are wondering, I was the ghost of a murderer who appeared to be missing from my chair and then snuck up behind people with a foam sword. I wore a creepy plastic mask and a garbage bag to cover my clothes, and apparently, no one could tell who I was because it was so dark that they couldn’t see my hair!)

Around 9:15, after everyone had been through the haunted house, we switched to a dance soundtrack, courtesy of yours truly, and commenced, well, dancing! I tried to include a mix of Chinese and Korean popular songs (they tend to like Korean music and film here), American pop circa our middle school days (i. e. Backstreet Boys, Spice Girls, etc.), and popular rap and hip-hop that we dance to nowadays. I also put in quite a few novelty songs and songs to which we could teach them the dances, such as the Cha-Cha Slide and the YMCA. Of course, not everyone danced, but it did seem to be a much more popular option than sitting in the provided chairs and snacking. We sadly had to end our party a little after 10:00, though many of us were ready to dance for at least a couple more hours.

All in all, I think that everyone had fun mingling and dancing. I know that I had a blast! We were initially a bit worried, but the decorations, planning, and everything seemed to come together at the last minute. Oh, yeah, and I was a fairy with my roommate, Orange. It was a good night!

Tonight, I’m going to Shanghai with Andreina to meet up with our friends Yonathan and Yulia. Happy Halloween!