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The festival of Halloween is observed on the 31st of October every year, to
honor the dead and deceased. It is believed that every year, at this time, the
spirits rise from their grave and mingle with the living. Although the festival
is not a traditional holiday in France, it is celebrated every year by the
locals. In fact, with every passing year, the festival is increasingly gaining
popularity among the French masses and is widely influencing their cultural and
social lives. A major contributor towards this effect is corporate marketing.
Due to the advertising and branding of products, people are increasingly being
attracted to the many customs and traditions of this unique festival. Also, due
to globalization, the festival is gradually been incorporated the social network
of the people residing in France.
The first celebration of Halloween in France was marked in the year 1982, when
people from the American Dream Bar/ Restaurant started observed it. Gradually,
their attempts to familiarize the festival among the natives bore fruit and by
1995, their customers became more and more familiar with the festival. Moreover,
the famous Mask Museum in Saint-Hilaire-Saint-Florent was established by Cesar
group in 1992 and the owners of the museum started to work towards the expansion
of the festival throughout France, from the following year. In 1995, the
president of the company Optus Opus, Philippe Cahen, claimed that he alone was
responsible for the introduction and popularization of the festival in France.
In the year 1996, residents of the St. Germain-en-Laye village in France held a
Halloween party on the 24th of October, in the middle of the day. This was an
attempt to give the locals an idea about why Halloween is celebrated and what
the festival is all about. In the present times, brands like Coca Cola, Pepsi
and McDonalds are increasingly popularizing the festival, to promote their
products, by making use of Halloween images like pumpkins, broom-sticks etc.
Thus, the new generation in France celebrates Halloween as any average American
teenage or kid. The popular tradition of ‘trick or treating’ is also done here
and young kids and children wander from house to house, seeking goodies and
confectioneries from people. This custom, however, initially started on a
store-to-store basis, rather than from house-to-house.
Like with any other festival, Halloween is also celebrated in France by
arranging parties and get-togethers, where people spend some quality time
together, consuming sumptuous homemade cookies, pastries and many other
mouth-watering delicacies. A particular attraction in such parties is that
people usually come wearing different types of weird costumes and outfits, to
fit into the mood of the occasion. This includes ghoulish attires like that of
ghosts, goblins, ogres, witches, mummies, vampires etc. Apart from this, stores
are decorated; lanes are lined with colorful and decorative lights, religious
services are held and people even visit cemeteries to pay homage to their
deceased friends and relatives. The increasing familiarity of the people with
the festival has also been a boon for the pumpkin cultivators. With the
increasing demand for jack-o’-lanterns during Halloween, pumpkin cultivation has
been growing much.
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