SEOUL - Halloween will never be the same again in South Korea, after 156 people died and scores more were injured in a horrific crowd crush on Oct 29 while attending parties in Seoul’s nightlife hub Itaewon ahead of the celebration that falls on Oct 31.
For the first time in years, there were no boisterous children in costumes roaming my neighbourhood squealing “Trick or Treat?” when Halloween rolled around on Monday.
Nor were there any parties in the homes of the fellow foreigners who live here in Hannam-dong, adjacent to Itaewon.
Both areas are located within the central Yongsan district of Seoul, home to more than 19,000 foreigners, including expatriates, diplomats and me.
Halloween comes to life in these two areas every year, with many homes and shopfronts decorated with ghostly figures, creepy-crawlies, jack-o’-lanterns and more.
Even at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, when numbers for gatherings were restricted, the community kept the annual tradition going by being extra-careful with crowd control and frequent hand sanitising.
This year, however, the streets were eerily quiet, everyone mindful of the week-long national mourning period for the victims of the crush, many of whom were in their 20s and gone too soon.
In a move dubbed “Erasing Halloween”, businesses big and small removed all Halloween-related products, promotions, events and even decorations.
It’s as if South Korea never celebrated the festival, which is an imported tradition, anyway.
Introduced by missionaries and celebrated by American soldiers stationed here with their families, Halloween became known to South Koreans after clubs and bars in Itaewon started to host festive parties in the 1990s.
That was a time when young foreigners started to move to South Korea, many of them from the United States and Europe, to teach English at a growing number of private English academies.
These foreigners were naturally drawn to Itaewon, home to many soldiers deployed at a major US army base nearby.
For many of them, the area offered a rare taste of home – from American burgers to Irish pubs, Santorini-themed restaurants and, of course, Halloween.
South Korea opened up to the world in the wake of the hallyu boom in the 2000s, and Halloween has since been commercialised by businesses to target young consumers who love anything fun and cool, while kindergarten teachers use the opportunity to bring some costumed fun to their classes.
Young South Koreans now celebrate Halloween in the same way those in Singapore, Japan and Hong Kong do, and many head for Itaewon in costumes for the ultimate Halloween party experience.
As many as 200,000 people joined the festivities in Itaewon in 2017, but everything was in order.
Even tourists were drawn to Halloween in Itaewon as borders reopened post-Covid-19, after the festival was featured in the 2020 hit drama Itaewon Class.
In an episode of the Netflix series, costumed vampires, ghost brides, pirates and maids are seen in the scenes set in Itaewon, accompanied by a female narrator’s voice explaining how “people enjoy a festival from America here” every year.
“Apparently they try to comfort the spirits of the dead and ward off evil spirits,” she says.
“People are dressed in strange costumes and bizarre make-up, so evil spirits won’t do them harm. A lot of grown-ups enjoy this festival in funny costumes.
“It feels like you’re in a foreign country. And everyone looks so free... And I fell in love with this place.”
She speaks for many young South Koreans, who enjoy Halloween in Itaewon because it is seen as exotic, trendy and different.
For me, Halloween is a time for home parties and for my horror-loving daughter to get creative about costumes.
We jumped at an invitation from a fellow Singaporean to go trick-or-treating at the nearby US army base when we first moved here in 2015, and have never looked back.
I even took over the helming of an annual neighbourhood event in 2021 and turned the street in front of my house into “Trunk or Treat” alley, with adults in costumes standing by their spookily decorated car boots and giving out candies to children who stopped by.
My own car was decked out in a Squid Game theme; my daughter was a gun-toting pink soldier.
Her costumes have become more spooktacular over the years, from mere Princess Elsa in 2015 to puppet Marionette of Five Nights at Freddy’s in 2020, complete with a hand-drawn mask.
In 2022, she had planned to reprise her 2019 Halloween character, Sadako from The Ring, climbing out of a Sony TV set.
But the moment we got news of the tragic crowd crush, we knew Halloween was doomed.
My daughter’s school cancelled its celebration plans, and everyone stayed home on the night of Oct 31.
All the fun associated with the festival has been sucked out, replaced with gloom and sadness.
No one knows if the festivities will return to Itaewon.
It will be a shame if the tradition is erased for good, but scars need to heal first and the authorities need time to figure out how to make Itaewon a safer place for revellers, without the worry of another crowd crush.
