Three Costume Day

Yesterday was Halloween, one of my favorite holidays, but unfortunately one that isn’t really celebrated here. Still, I managed to. And I managed to wear three costumes, a Halloween trifecta that I have never achieved before.

On the Women in Black calendar, October 31 isn’t Halloween, but the anniversary of the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325, which calls for women to be involved in peacemaking and a gender perspective in peacekeeping missions. To mark the day, we had a press conference, street performance, meeting with members of the Serbian Assembly and network meeting.

I participated in the performance. Eight of us began dressed in roles assigned by patriarchy: a bride, a priest, a soldier, numerous housewives (I was a pregnant housewife). We then faced a mirror, asked if that was what we wanted, and transformed into something else – activists, feminists, politicians. I became a futbalerka. I dribbled my ball around the square, amazed that I had retained some muscle memory of how to do such things, slowly getting soaked by the rain.

And then in the evening, another transformation. A few friends and I decided to throw a Halloween party in a small café. We invited nearly everyone we knew. I was impressed with the number of people who showed up and the number of amazing costumes. I was a fairy princess: wings, wand, crown, polka-dotted sun dress (pictures coming soon). If there had been a costume contest, I would have given prizes to Cruella De Vil (who somehow made half her hair white) and MK and B, who were Tymoshenko and Yushenko (complete with a creepy dioxin-poisoned face), respectively. Definitely the most creative costume idea. (And my friends and I further reveal ourselves to be big nerds.)

I throw parties very rarely. I was nervous about this one, wondering if anyone would come, thinking to myself early in the night that if I didn’t care so much for Halloween, there was no way that I would go out on such a dark and stormy night. A few hours into the party, though, J, A, and I looked around the small café, full of witches, a devil, a gangster, a French woman, a vampire, and a number of people not in costume, and called the night a success.