Hallowe’en is 31st October, right? Well, think again…
Monday, October 26th, 2009We all know Christmas is on 25th December, and Bonfire Night is remembered on the 5th November, and Hallowe’en is on 31st October, and….wait a minute…in the town of Kilmarnock in Scotland, the town where Burns’ poems were first published, the home of Johnnie Walker whisky, they don’t believe in following the crowd. If a custom adhered to by the rest of the world isn’t to their taste, they just change it to suit themselves!
The rest of the world celebrates Hallowe’en on 31st October every year, but in Kilmarnock, the annual festival of freakish frolics is a moveable feast.
Rather than stick to this one simple date, the whole town celebrates Hallowe’en on the LAST FRIDAY in October! No matter which date this falls on.
The odd custom has been a tradition in the town for “dunkeys” (donkey’s years) – as long as anyone can remember – and no-one quite knows why. Maybe the custom dates to the industrial and mining past of the town when men were paid on Fridays, but this explanation doesn’t account for the fact that other nearby settlements don’t follow the same rules.It is a bizarre mystery that may never be satisfactorily solved, but is cherished by the townspeople, who have fun baiting incomers to the area when the kids are trick-or-treating (or “guising ” in the Scottish tongue). Many a kid from a family new to the town has wandered the streets in vain on the 31st, in the forlorn hope that eventually one door he “chaps” on will be answered with a welcome, rather than the frosty “We’ve already had it” response from the born-and-bred occupants.
Spooky!
see: East Ayrshire Council
first published: July 8th, 2008
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