Halloween hijinks

Well, we just came through a whole weekend of Halloween. For many years, Australia has tried to latch onto the American holiday without the support of the masses.

I spent many of my younger years trying to get Halloween up and going in my small country town. There were hundreds of kids dressed in all sorts of outfits, bashing on strangers’ doors, screaming ‘Trick or Treat’.

The poor older locals wondering if we were selling raffle tickets for school.

My costume always consisted of something flowy with a wig. And you would sometimes end up with a sack full of goodies – or if the street wasn’t that imaginative, a couple of canned fruits. Needless to say, Halloween didn’t really take off, and by that stage my mum was over it also, so we stayed out of the town during future dress-up festivities.

This year it seemed Sydney embraced the whole weekend. Every girl was dressed in something ‘Whore-y’ and boy showed they aren’t scared to throw on a bit of lycra.

There were the gallons of fake blood that those who were less creative basically just dipped themselves in – it seemed almost everyone got into the spirit of things.

The crowds were on their best behaviour; maybe it was because I was able to walk right into them without anyone batting an eyelash.

So is that what we have to do, get everyone in costume? Could it have been that it brought out the little kids in all of us, and fun just took over?

Like most of the showgirls out there, I decided to turn my hand at the Wicked character Elphaba, who is completely green.

And like magic, the crowds on the streets would part. Everyone has seen an ugly witch, but when it’s a pretty one, greener than green, it’s fabulous. I’m still removing the green from my ears and that was Saturday. But bring on more dress-up days, it brings the child out in all of us.