Today is Halloween, and it’s been one of my favorite holidays since I was a child.  And even though I love it so much, I realized that I know almost nothing about its origins.

So I investigated.

Halloween was originally known as Hallowmas, or Saint’s mass — a three-day observance and feast to honor the deceased and pray for Christian souls. As early as the 13th century, all regions of Europe had its own version of All Saint’s Day.

Equally important, the indigenous civilizations of North and Central America have been honoring their ancestors and rebirth in celebrations for around 3,000 years. When the Spanish arrived, their Christian influence hybridized the month’s practice into Día de los Muertos, a two-day period to honor the dead and respect the cycle of life.

So how did we get to our modern celebration?

In the colonies, Puritans held strong opposition to the “pagan” traditions of Halloween. However, with the influx of Irish and Scottish immigrants in the 19th century, Halloween slowly assimilated into mainstream culture. Its first mention in an American publication was in 1911, and by the late 1930s people from all socio-economic, religious and racial backgrounds were celebrating the holiday.

And it turns out, these observances hold direct connections to our own festivities.

From Ireland, we get the Jack-o-Lantern, hollow turnips lighting the way for lost souls, adapted to the American native pumpkin. From England, we received “souling,” an early version of trick-or-treating.  Children and the impoverished would go door to door, chanting rhymes and asking for “soul cakes,” baked for charity. In addition, from Mexican and Scottish customs, participants adorn costumes to either mock death, disguise oneself from evil spirits or create masked mischief. Lastly, Mexican tradition strongly encourages the locality to share with one another, everyone contributing to the shindig.

All in all, this period historically has centered around death, life and remembering our ancestors. So have we strayed from the true purpose of this ritual? When I asked some classmates what they associate with celebrating Halloween, the answers strongly suggested that the holiday has strayed.

Popular answers included “candy,” “pure fun” and “trick-or-treating.”  And when asked about their college celebrations, mostly one word was uttered: “partying.”

On one hand, it can be strongly argued that our secular society has lost the spiritual aspect of the holiday. Elementary schools facilitate dress-up, but omit conversations of ancestry and the universal subject of death.

Luckily, Día de los Muertos celebrations are on the rise, including processions in the Mission District of San Francisco and midtown Sacramento. These Festivals of the Altar are free and open to the public, and everyone is encouraged to bring flowers, candles and tokens for departed loved ones. In our fast-paced technological world, the organizers of the Mission procession encourage us to spend these days strengthening “our connections beyond our immediate concerns.”

Yet, Halloween still seems to unite us all. Far from its religious roots, children from all circumstances can dress up and join the merriment. I say it’s downright American; anyone can be anything.

Furthermore, in a world with school shootings, ever-increasing airport security and child predators, my hope is that this tradition continues to allow children to walk the streets safely in every neighborhood of the United States. That we can put aside discourses on high fructose corn syrup and child obesity, and trust our neighbors to give children candy. For one day the whole community can have fun together.

If you want to contact the dead with DANIEL HERMAN you can email him at dsherman@ucdavis.edu.

How many times have you shared a smile with a stranger? Think about it. Just today: when you bought your coffee and she told you to have a nice day, when you bumped into him on the sidewalk and you both mumbled apologies, when you crossed the road quickly because that driver insisted that you cross first. Each exchange contains a brief moment of eye contact and complimentary smile. Is this due to human nature? No. This behavior is cultural.

Whether because of our Hollywood-obsessed psyche or our enormous investment in perfected orthodontics, America is without a doubt, addicted to smiling. Americans will smile when we are happy, when we are uncomfortable, when we are see something funny or slightly interesting.

I come from a town where people going for their morning power walks will greet you with a big grin and a chipper, “Good morning!”

To me, this level of friendliness wasn’t excessive or grating, it was almost common courtesy. To the rest of the world, this exchange seems to equate to Disney On Crack. You just try to squeeze in a “Bonjour” to a French lady going for her morning power cigarette and you would be lucky to hold some brief, albeit hostile eye contact.

This inevitably has an effect on street performance.

Usually there is a little song-and-dance that goes along with the interaction between performer and audience. Some people are sitting near you and will hear a whole song; many more are passing you, catching only snippets of your songs as they go about their daily tasks. Usually the people passing will throw you a smile as you play. You take this for granted. It seems natural, second nature! Which makes it all the more unnerving when smiling is somehow subtracted from the routine.

When I was in Germany over the summer I took my guitar with me, for company if nothing else. The first few times I saw some interesting results. Like always, I had tried to find a relatively inoffensive place to play — a public park in the middle of the day. Strangely, the overwhelming reaction I got was uncomfortable.

I had made sure not to leave my case open or anything resembling a tip jar and yet, when I smiled at anyone, they hurried away as if I had asked for their firstborn child. It wasn’t unpleasant, just bizarre and invigorating. I had the power to make every passing stranger visibly nervous. Sometimes a passerby would breathe strangely loud through their nose as they walked quickly by, which I totally counted as acknowledgement. Not a single smile was seen.

Of course location is everything. When I visited a university town in Germany I got a much warmer response. Maybe too warm in some respects.

Again I had chosen a public park. Most of the populace gave me a wide diameter of space; if they did look at me it was hesitance bordering on suspicion. A young couple, however, approached and set up a blanket a little ways in front of me. I wasn’t acknowledged throughout this process but they could have chosen anywhere to sit so I figured they could be considered my audience.

Then they began to suck face about five feet from me and my bench. It would have been cute had it not been mildly gross, but hey, I’m a good sport so I serenaded their little picnic until they got up to leave and the guy thanked me — presumably for helping him get laid.

A while later an older couple approached as I was playing some Bob Dylan. They handed me a couple euros, which I graciously accepted.

“Danke!” I said, butchering the accent.

“Ah,” said the husband, picking up on my foreignness. “You speak English?”

“Yes!” I replied. “I’m from America!”

We began to talk about Bob Dylan and songwriting and the ’60s.

“You know,” I said after a while, “Street performing is different in Germany. People here seem nervous, they hardly make eye contact. You two are the first to approach me and start up a conversation!”

“Well we are not German,” they declared. “We are Swiss!”

“Ah!” I said, as if that explained everything.

Maybe it did. After a bit, they left, smiling as they waved goodbye.

Though I don’t consider myself one to get homesick, it was nice to come back to a country where passersby give you a gold-star smile for effort. We are addicted to smiling and we are nowhere near to finding a cure, and just the thought of it leaves me grinning.

For some great makeout music contact ELLY OLTERSDORF at elly.oltersdorf@gmail.com

The University of California’s union TAs, readers, custodians, hospital workers, technical employees and more are all holding strike authorization votes this week. Graduate student-workers are voting Nov. 4 to 6, service workers voted Oct. 29 and 30, and professional and technical employees have already voted 92 percent in favor to authorize a strike.

These union workers have been meeting with a series of Unfair Labor Practices from the UC — including intimidating striking service workers last spring and withholding information from TAs during their negotiations for a new contract. And all of these unions have emphasized the need to fight to defend the UC’s status as a top education and research university: smaller discussions so they can attend to undergraduate students, more competitive funding for graduate students to keep the UC a top research university, better patient care in UC hospitals, increased hours to clean campus buildings.

The call for a strike vote from UAW 2865, the union of UC readers and TAs, came last week in a meeting here at UC Davis in Wellman Hall, with representatives from every UC campus and dozens of rank-and-file Davis graduate student-workers participating. What does this strike vote mean? It means not that there will be an immediate strike, but that union officers are authorized to call a strike if circumstances merit.

With TAs increasingly expressing concerns that current large classes simply do not allow them to give their students the individual attention they will need, circumstances are already desperate. Voting is just a first step, but it demonstrates the severity of problems at UC.

Caroline McKusick

Anthropology Ph.D. student

Guide, UAW 2865 Student-Workers’ Union

“We’ve got about 30 kids in this county that I’m at that are homosexuals. And it is sickening,” cries 14-year-old radio talk show host Caiden Cowger to thousands of listeners. “I’m going to tell you this, guys: President Obama and Vice President Biden are making kids gay!”

Some of you may find this appalling; others may not think this statement is so far-fetched. Cowger’s rant soon went viral, sparking heated discussion everywhere on the issue of gay marriage. Those on the left scathingly criticized him using epithets such as “dick” and “little asshole,” while those on the social right quickly jumped to his defense.

Cowger’s case is not an isolated incident, either. Every four years, presidential elections bring out the worst in people. Otherwise normal citizens begin calling each other names like “baby killer,” “woman hater” and “fag enabler,” not realizing that whomever they elect as the leader of our country has little control over abortion, women’s rights or gay marriage.

Now, a cynic might argue that I singled out Cowger to attack the right wing, but such is not my intention at all. He is entitled to his opinion, and, thanks to the First Amendment, free to broadcast it to the masses. I’m not necessarily criticizing him or anyone else for their views on homosexuality.

I’m criticizing them because they base their condemnation of the President on something over which he has virtually no control. For those of you still convinced that my bias is showing through, let me give you another anecdote.

Last election, my mother asked me who I would vote for, were I eligible to vote, with the addendum that Romney would ruin this country if elected. As a political progressive, even I found this pretty grossly naive, so I asked her how exactly he would do so.

Her instantaneous response went something along the lines of, “Well, he doesn’t like gay people!” I don’t know Mitt Romney personally, but I highly doubt that he hates all homosexuals solely on the premise of their sexual orientation. Even if he did, I have plenty of friends in support of gay rights who would still vote for him because they agree with him on fiscal and foreign policy issues, among many other things.

I told my mom that, while I would vote for Obama, it would be because, at the time of the election, he had cut the federal deficit by $312 billion and increased government spending at a slower rate than any president since World War II, not because of his magical ability to instantly legalize gay marriage and abortion in all 50 states.

As much as I supported Obama in the 2012 election, I would rather people not vote at all than vote for him without an educated stance on his positions. I have infinitely more respect for someone who votes Republican and has a carefully thought-out position that they can readily defend than for someone who votes Democrat because “Republicans hate women and minorities.”

Making prejudices about our opponents has caused party polarization, which in turn has caused politicians to become overly dogmatic in order to appeal to their constituents. We saw it with Rick Santorum’s short-lived presidential run last year: the bread and butter of his platform was conservative social policy, which made up most of his talking points.

His extremely polarizing persona, which relied heavily on his Christian morals, took almost all of the media attention away from his grossly incomplete fiscal policy proposal, which economists hated with near unanimity.

Yet this man won the Republican primary in three states and finished second in five others, over Romney, Gingrich and Ron Paul, all of whose proposed fiscal policies made up a large chunk of their platform. This is just one example of how some Americans care much more about social issues than economic ones.

My intent here is not to undermine the importance of social issues, but to stress that social policy change usually happens in state legislatures and rarely rests upon the shoulders of the federal government. So please, when voting for the leader of our country, don’t relegate their role to that of a mere social policy advocate. Instead, consider the practical effects this candidate would have on our country before you cast your ballot.

If you want to call ZACH MOORE a “little asshole,” email him at zcmoore@ucdavis.edu.

In January 2012, the Minor Alcohol Preclusion Act (MAPA) was introduced to the Davis City Council. The act was proposed in light of community and council members’ concerns over underage drinking and neighborhood disturbances. City Council was scheduled to meet on Oct. 9, but will reconvene in 2014 instead to discuss the act.

The Davis Police can already make arrests for drinking-related conduct, such as public inebriation, possessing an open container and supplying minors with alcohol. There are also other local ordinances that attempt to curb “nuisance parties” and social gatherings that serve alcohol to minors.

If MAPA were enacted, the Davis Police would be able to charge minors with public inebriation if found with a blood alcohol content (BAC) of 0.02 percent or higher. What’s particularly unique about this act is that minors are allowed to drink in private, but can be subject to BAC tests and fines with probable reason if drunk in public areas.

Indeed, we do sympathize — and often, empathize — with our neighbors who have to suffer through the drunken rowdiness and eloquent conversations students yell at each other at 2 a.m. However, we do have some concerns with this proposed “solution.”

We know that those under the influence of alcohol are not the most functional group of people. If MAPA were to be passed, students may be more encouraged to drive home intoxicated instead of walk home, for fear of getting stopped and having their BAC tested.

A drinking culture is inevitable in a college town. Yes, the act would reduce the number of public disturbances, but does that encourage underage drinking in private settings rather than in public?

The City of Davis is made up of about 33,000 UC Davis students. Approximately 25,000 are undergraduates, meaning the majority of those students are under the age of 21. How will a police officer differentiate between minors and those of legal drinking age? We anticipate awkward moments.

Additionally, minors are not the only ones who create neighborhood disturbances. The act does not formally state what police officers are supposed to do with those of legal drinking age who cause disruptions in the community.

When City Council meets again, we’d like to see more defined criteria and expectations for MAPA, an emphasis on alcohol education in combination with enforcement and better student/community/police relations.

If the police can have our BACs, we’d like to have their backs, too.