Bonfire Night

Had you heard this poem before?
It is about a celebration here in the UK called "Bonfire Night" or "Guy Fawkes' Day".

In 1605, a group of people planned to blow up the Hoses of Parliament, in London, a kill the king, James I, because they wanted another queen who had the same religion as them.
One of these men was called Guy Fawkes.
Everything was carefully planned and they filled a cellar* under the Parliament with gunpowder*.
But the night before the explosion, on the 5th of November, Guy Fawkes was captured. He was tortured until he confessed and then he was executed.
To warn everybody not to break the law again, the King marked this day by having a bonfire and made a dummy* Guy to burn on the flames.
Since that day, every 5th of November there are bonfires and fireworks all over Britain, to celebrate the foiled plot*.

Here is a photo of fireworks in London:

And these are photos and a video I took of the fireworks and bonfires where I live:

If you want to know more about Bonfire Night, click here!--> Bonfire Night


Have a lovely week!
Macarena.



*Click on words for definitions.

Halloween

Hello, everybody!!
How are you?
I know I haven't updated this in ages, but I am really busy! Sorry about that!
Today I will tell you about how Halloween is celebrated here in the U.K., and I will show you some of the things I did to celebrate it.
The truth is that Halloween started here in the U.K. and in Ireland many years ago, as a Celtic celebration. It was believed that on the night of the 31st of October, the limits between the world of the living and the world of the dead became blurred, so it was possible for dead people to come to our world (don't worry, it is just a legend, it is not true!) So the living decided to dress up as dead people in order to be confused and that way the spirits would not haunt them.
Then, it started being celebrated more in the USA, and then it came back to England and the rest of Europe, as I am sure you know, because you celebrate it in Madrid as well.

So here is what I did:
First we went to a pumpkin patch in a lovely village near here where there are a lot of different kinds of pumpkins.

Every year, they make a collage with pumpkins, representing something and they display it in a little market. Can you guess what it is?

There were really big ones!

The night before halloween, two friends and myself got together to carve our pumpkins. Here, children will only go trick-or-treating to a house where there are Jack-o-Lanterns at the door. And we wanted trick-or-treaters! We had a lot of fun carving them!

I look concentrated, don't I? haha

 And here's the result!

Mine is a scared pumpkin, rather than a scary one! haha 

On the 31st, the University dining hall was nicely decorated and there were original things to eat, like these yogurts and treat pots:

At night, I put my Jack-o-Lantern at the door of my house, and lots of children came trick-or-treating. It was really dark, so the photo is quite bad, but you can see it more or less.

Now it's your turn to tell me what you did for Halloween! Did you do anything special at school? Did you dress up and go trick-or-treating?

Leave your comments below!

Take care!

Macarena.