This makes me feel Amused Delighted Humored Ironic at an Cultural / Public scale
Mundane Halloween
"In Japan, the #地味ハロウィン (translation: #MundaneHalloween) tradition has people coming up with very clever costumes of all-too-familiar situations and people."
On Twitter, I came across a page with posts of Japanese people wearing costumes that are representative of familiar people and experiences as part of an event known as 地味ハロウィン, or Mundane Halloween. The costumes are pretty humorous, some examples being a “person who is quietly despairing over the lack of seats with power outlets in a cafe they popped into” and a “person who refused a bag but their item ended up not fitting in their purse.” I looked up the event and found that it was started in 2014 by a group of adults on the website Daily Portal Z. The event was catered towards adults who wanted to participate in Halloween but did not want to have costumes that were too showy. Instead, they dressed up in witty costumes that could be found in people’s daily lives. The event this year was held both in-person and virtually.
Contributer notes
What is surprising, refreshing, most interesting?
I find it interesting that we often associate Halloween costumes with fantasy, yet these costumes are depicting reality. These costumes are just as entertaining, as they are an opportunity to find humor in daily social life.
Key Insights? What can we learn from this?
What I love about this is that these people are still engaging in Halloween festivities in their own way, and although their costumes are not very flashy they are clever and thoughtful. They highlight aspects of contemporary life that we notice but don’t often acknowledge.