Also this week I attended Winton's school's field trip to a pumpkin patch.
Hallowe'en is an exciting time, what with the pumpkins and the promise of much candy to come.
But it's hard to get a straight answer from anyone about why we do these things (Ok sure, ghoulish things around an old festival for departed spirits . . . but why the candy?).
I wound up driving there with a new parent and her daughter, both from Burkina Faso, both only in the US for 3 weeks, and both only speaking French.
Trying to explain with inadequate vocabulary and a complete inability to conjugate verbs into the correct tenses left me telling this poor woman something about kids and faces on pumpkins . . . baffling.
The whole theory that the pumpkin carving custom comes from eastern europeans carving turnips or rutabagas into lanterns is also hard to swallow. Those roots are so dense once they're big enough to hold a candle.
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