The morning after....

I got up (relatively) early this morning to have a final, artery clogging breakfast with our Belfast guests and to head to the bus station to survey the damage from a night of Halloween revelry in downtown Derry.

Amazingly, the streets were wiped (relatively) clean, the vendors long boarded up and departed, and all but a few pink feathers remained of the costumes that filled the streets the night before.

It was as if the bedlam never happened.

Because bedlam, I'm afraid, is the only suitable word for downtown Derry in the wee hours of the monring. Glass, food, bodily fluids, and wrappers lined the ground. Fourteen-year-old "sexy" witches and "sexy" police officers necked with pirates and drag queens in every available corner. Oompa Loompas staggered home past Sponge Bob Squarepants.

And nine fabulous flatmates (plus friends) made their way home from a night of Halloween festivities that proved Derry really is the wildest place on the Emerald Isle to take in All Hallows Eve.

Before I regale you all in the tales of our lot - a ragtag ensemble of politicians, pop culture icons, horror scream queens, and generic characters - I understand that the question on many of your minds much undoubtedly be, "Just why is Halloween so big in Derry?"

According to the tourist office, it's not just big. It's THE biggest Halloween celebration in the world, drawing in thousands of goblins for a parade, concert and fireworks display. The tradition began in 1986 when Ireland's Halloween capital moved from Westmeath to Derry. Historians belived that Halloween may have actually started in Westmeath, home of the Hill of Uisneach, also known as The Catstone. Uisneach was a site where people gathered for religious rites, town business and community games. Autumn was marked with an even greater occult activity than usual, with spirits a-visiting on Samhain Eve. The souls of the dead returned to their old homes and our ancestors headed for Uisneach or Tara, ancient royal and religious sites.

No matter how it started, Derry reigns as the unofficial capitol of all things Halloween.

We started our evening fairly early after a day of last-minute Halloween shopping and preparation. Around 4, the troops began gathering in the flat to begin assembling our garb. In a throwback to day's past, I decided to modify the dead prom queen theme of my college days into a full "Carrie" costume, complete with tiara and fake blood. Geoff (a Mitchell from Belfast) and Ben decided to splurge for masks and went as George Bush and Michael Jackson, respectively. Jasper and Jay decided to be pirates. John won best flatmate costume with his full knight gear and his friend Niell won for homemade creativity with his bus conductor get up. The best pop culture reference went to Barry and Kerry, who decided to be Sid and Nancy, a rock and roll tragedy. Sarah, one of our Irish friends, came as a genie. (I've uploaded pictures of everyone's costumes onto my photo site.)

The problem with events like Halloween, however, is that there is that the anticipation often kills the execution. As we walked through town during the day, the festive spirit was almost palpable downtown. Vendors set up to peddle greasy and fried fare on passersby, little kids lined up at the mall to get their faces painted, the entire town was decorated. It was hard not to feel excited.

That just increased as we made our way downtown. We joined a throng of costumed pilgrims, slowly walking along the riverfront. It was almost surreal. You could see the city centre's lights in the foreground and everywhere, front to back, you were flanked with costumed revelers. Tiny kids, parents, teenagers, college students. Everyone in costume just moving, en masse, toward the light.

Our first order of business, as it should have been, was to sample the food. I sprang for the large hotdog (smothered in onions and mushrooms.... mmmm... weight gain) and a bag of cotton candy. (Not necessarily because I wanted it but because it was there.) Then part of the group headed to the bar to stake out a table while the rest of us headed to the waterfront for the fireworks display.

The fireworks, on their own, were mildly impressive. Even more impressive, however, was the crowd. I'm not estimator (and the newspapers aren't too big on specifics the next day) but it looked like more than a thousand people squeezed behind the Guildhall to watch the display. We saw two very convincing oompa loompas, a gag-worthy dead demon, and an innumerable amount of "sexy" insert noun here girls. In other words, take any object, person, or occupation, hike the skirt, unbutton the shirt and add high heels. It was a bit disturbing, I thought, to see how many young girls were so scantily clad. In fact, it seemed that the high school and middle school-aged kids were worse than the college kids. My friend Kerry, who donned a leather mini skirt and bustier to be Nancy, was a bit disappointed that she might get shoved into the same category as those girls. "But I'm not a 'sexy' rock star," she kept protesting. "I'm a pop culture icon!"

After the fireworks, we spent the rest of the evening in a bar called "Bound for Boston." It's dark, gritty, and typically filled with grungy "I hate everything that's mainstream" types. We've been there before and it's typically a nice place to grab a pint without being forced to dodge girls in sparkly tank tops, a throbbing dance floor, or punk teenagers. On this night, however, it had one very specific thing going for it:

It was free.

(Most of the clubs capitalize on the Halloween craziness by tacking on a £10 cover charge. That's roughly $20 to stand in a throbbing mass on the dance floor bouncing to and fro.)

Because of the free-ness, however, the bar was crowded with a few, typically unlikely patrons. Most of the girls were responding to the "tack 'sexy' onto your costume and you'll look older and more desirable" memo and a number of the kids looked under 18. And it was more crowded than I've ever seen it -- wall to wall costumes.

Since we had a pretty large group, I stood outside our booth to get a birds eye view of the crowd. (At Bound for, the booths actually look like rail cars and sit up on platforms to the side. So if you are in the booth, you can be relatively enclosed. It's nice for chatting. Subpar for people watching.) The atmosphere was incredible... so many people in costume, high-fiving perfect strangers, shouting out "what are you???" underneath a cobwebbed ceiling. Some of the costumes were well done but few were incredibly creative. Spongebob was a hit. As was a dead-on Jesus. I appreciated the meticulous accuracy of Willy Wonka and his chocolate bar (complete with golden ticket).

******

My favorite experiences:

1) Kerry, standing on the outside of the bar, notices a chap dressed like a punk rocker.

"Ask him who he is.. I think he might be another Sid Vicious."

Indeed, he was.

"OHMYGOD!," She screamed, feverishly pointing to her chest, "I'M NANCY!"

The look of pure elation, as if this chap had finally found his other half, was classic. (Luckily, Kerry's actual Sid, Barry, was out of earshot.)

2) We send Niell to the bar. We look up and in the span of minutes, he is making out with a girl at a table. A few minutes later, he returns.

"How did that happen?" I asked later.

"She was sitting across from my friend so I sat down next to her," he said. "It wasn't very good though. Afterward she said I was a crap kisser so I got up and left."

"That's horrible"

"Eh, it's true."

"But wait a second," I said. "You just sat down next to her and started making out? You didn't know her? I feel as though I'm misssing a crucial piece of the story."

Blank look. "No, that's about it."

3) On the way to the bar, a woman with a videocamera stopped Ben (Michael Jackson) to take his picture.

"Can you do any moves?" she asked, at which point Ben Cote, possibly our future president, began moonwalking across Guildhall square, complete with Jackson groin grab and "oooh oooh." I nearly died.

4) On the way to the bathroom, I was manhandled by a painted Incredible Hulk, kissed on the cheek, spun around, and then deposited back in line.

Later, Geoff says, "Wait a second, he spun you around?"

"Yes."

"Like over the top of his head?"

Eh, no.

5) My best conversations of the night happened in the bathroom line where, undoubtedly, someone would look up and go, "Hey! Carrie White from the movie, right? What's your name, that's fantastic!"

"Thanks, my name is Carie!"

"Right, but your real name...."

6) We stopped Jesus, the character, long enough to ask for some sage advice.

"It's like that movie Maid in Manhattan," he said. "It had Jennifer Lopez in it but it didn't have Jesus."

*****

After finishing up at Bound for and unsuccessfully trying to find a free dance club, we made our way home, past other stumbling characters. On the way, I couldn't help but gasp at the state of the city. Glass literally lined the streets. Teenagers made out in plain view along every wall. Trash littered the ground.

The most disturbing thing, however, were the glass bottles that were thrown at the circling police. Not just random street punks but person after person assaulted the trucks with glass bottles. Undettered, the police just slowly drove past. No one, in fact, tried to stop the masses.

I couldn't believe it at the time and even more so this morning. It's just another example of the perplexing paradox of living in Derry. There is such a surface sense of conviviality and jubilee yet such a darker undercurrant of violence. At the time Kerry said, and it was absolutely true, "It's just so hard to rectify the image of teenagers making out one minute and then hurling bottles at the police the next."

All in all, however, the sight of Derry at Halloween lived up to its expectations. It was fun to be in the thick of it, surrounded by thousands of people celebrating in costume. I only wish I had the chance to see the parade or to sample more of the delicious street food...