Tickets to a Good Time

My Train & My Bus Tickets

We’re in Year 2 of our Australia life and Year 4 of my life as a nomad – living away from the US. That doesn't mean that Halloween goes on unnoticed. For a country classified as ‘Western’ and seems to follow the US model for almost anything in pop culture, I was surprised to find out that it really doesn't recognise this all important holiday. When I talked about some of my past costumes (Asylum Seeker, Tinkerbell, Sexy Pirate, Blue Man Group), Australians would look at me perplexed. “Shouldn't your costume be scary?” That’s just it though. Halloween shouldn't have to be all about being scary as pop culture portrays it. Nowadays, it’s a personal interpretation of what you would like to wear that you normally wouldn't.

Just like in Korea, the expat community celebrated Halloween regardless of the country’s lack of participation. One of the ways Dave and I expanded our network was to join expat groups. Lucky for us, Network Canada throws the biggest Halloween party not only in Australia, but in the Southern hemisphere!

Last year, we had the best time. We met up with some of our new friends, pre-gamed at our apartment and went to The Argyle in The Rocks. We had so much fun that we couldn’t remember what happened and couldn’t see the evidence because we had lost our camera. This year was no exception. At my birthday party on Cockatoo Island and King Street Wharf Brewhouse, we lost our camera yet again. No camera this time, but we celebrated in the same fashion.

We sent out a message a week before the party that we would be having pre-drinks at our new apartment 2 hours before. Now all we needed was costumes.

There are so many options. We could do a group theme or couple theme, we could do something from pop culture or we could be something obvious – witch, sexy pirate, cat etc.

I had planned on doing a group theme like Trolls or Smurfs, but it was too hard to get consensus. Dave and I went to Wynyard Station, the location of two of our favourite costume stores. We couldn’t find anything unique. Raising my hand in frustration, I looked at what I was holding and said, “Let’s just be tickets.”

It was like a Eureka! moment. Dave and I looked at each other and the rail tickets and knew this idea would be awesome! One of us could be the red rail ticket and the other could be the blue Travel 10 bus ticket – both very familiar pieces of paper that get us around Sydney. We scrapped the stores at Wynyard and went to an art supply store on Oxford Street.

Perfect Blue Poster Board For the Travel 10 Bus Ticket

For $40, we bought:

• Foam poster board
• Black, red and blue poster paper
• Red, white, blue face paint
• Glue sticks

At work, Dave secretly printed the words and logos we surely couldn't draw.

Every night the week before, we measured, stenciled, cut and glued the necessary pieces. We kept it a secret for the entire week. The excitement was building as we got closer to the party.

Getting The Right Measurements

Been Working on These for a Week!

The Saturday morning of the big party, we heard there would be possible showers. Rain or no rain, we needed to protect our boards, which would surely be ruined with drop of anything. My designer friend Missy suggested a brilliant idea at brunch – tape the entire thing with clear packing tape! It worked like a charm. If anything were to accidentally splash in our face, our boards would be protected.

Does My Head Look Big?

Perfect Fit

We prepared a party spread including my famous guacamole, cucumber sandwiches, salami and cheese sandwiches and an assortment of candies.

The Halloween Pre-Game Spread

Face Painting

By 6pm, guest started to arrive. A few of Dave’s work colleagues, my friend from Korea who had just arrived two weeks before and our American friends Ben and Blake stopped by. With drink in one hand and paint brushes in the other, we prepped our look. Dave and I each had to paint our faces like our board cutouts. When I opened the door for my Korean friend, she thought I was going as the Japanese flag. Her second guess was an Aboriginal! Our party was so impressed with our costumes. Some were even regretful that they had not participated as our My Multi and My Ferry tickets.

We're Ready for The Argyle

As we walked to the station, Dave and I decided to put on our boards. What better place to be dressed up than Kings Cross! The moment they were on our head, people took notice of us. Dressed in black with a board on our painted faces, we were huge walking City Rail tickets. With wide eyes, people smiled, pointed and often stopped, smiled and pointed.

We took the train to Martin Place. Our group was split up because half of the group had tickets and the other didn’t. My Korean friend and I went to the Argyle on our own. Keeping my head gear on, I had random train riders taking my photo from their seats. On George Street, I had people stop their moving vehicles to take a photo! I was like a celebrity and the city of Sydney was the paparazzi.

Train Ride From Kings Cross to Martin Place

We all luckily arrived together at The Argyle and waited for 5 minutes before the 9pm cutoff for free entry with costumes. While in line, people tapped our shoulders and often just jumped between us to take photos. We learned how to maneuver because when we turned our head, of course the entire board did too. It was pretty exhausting carrying a 3ft x 2ft board on your head and dodging through shoulder to shoulder crowds.

Picture Please

Stepping into The Argyle, I got flashbacks of the party the year before. Hundreds of people in costumes filled the country themed rooms. There was the American room, Canadian Room, French room and so on.

As we walked through, we experienced the same paparazzi moment, except this time everyone at the party was there to take photos. Dave and I learned how to pose. We would even push the person who wanted our photo in between us saying, “You stand here.”

I was Tagged on Facebook & I Don't Even Know This Girl!

At one point a ‘princess’ wanted to take our photo. I joked, “We had better win the costume contest. Too bad we don’t know where to enter.” She replied, “That would be me.” Score! She took our names down and we never saw her again.

Photo by The Argyle

*Check out the rest of the party here

For the rest of the night we continued on like Mickey Mouse at Disney World – people constantly grabbing us and asking for a photo. Surprisingly one of the most popular costume was Cleopatra!  We did manage to take a few pictures of our favourite costumes. When we spotted outstanding costumes, we took on a role reversal. We asked a group of Sesame Street monsters, Transformers, a Zebra, Sub Zero (my favourite childhood bad guy), a Smurf, a garden gnome, Ali G, Wayne Gretzky and a sticky note monster for a photo.

Francisco as Mario & Nayoung as Little Red Riding Hood

Sticky Note Monster

The Halloween Crew

Impressive Costumes

The Sesame Street Crew Won Best Group Costume

Sub Zero. Love Him!

Ali G & Wayne Gretzky

Someone Had to at a Canadian Party

Very Convincing Garden Gnome & Zebra

Zebra is pronounced as zeh-bra here

At midnight, the music stopped and a voice came over the speakers – it was time to announce costume winners. There were many categories and many winners including all those listed above. My heart sank as the names were called, but never hearing ours. The last category was Best Male costume and they announced Shadiyah and Dave. Woohoo! We were standing right in the middle of the ground floor and everyone looked at us and erupted. Dave and I looked at each other and screamed in surprise and excitement. We had devoted the entire week to these costumes. We endured being at a party with hundreds of people constantly either trying to avoid hitting people or being harassed for a photo. All of our efforts culminated in this one moment and we won!

We Won Best Male Costume!

The Judges Had to Give Best Group to Sesame Street

On our way out of the party, we stopped by the coat check to claim our prize – a 1.5 liter bottle of Gentlemen Jack, premium Jack Daniels product worth AU$200. We also got a travel bag, Finlandia branded beanies and other random goodies like bottle openers, electric candles and yo-yo’s – a hodgepodge gift from a hodgepodge party.

We toted our winnings down George Street to Korean town and sat down at a Korean barbecue restaurant at 2am. By 3am, we got into a cab for home.

The next morning, we felt like a train wrecks. We had been out all night, carrying large boards on our head and drinking many rum and cokes. My hair line was tender and bruised from the board, but it didn't matter. All we knew was that we were the winners! We had won one of the best costume prizes and were treated like celebrities. It was the most popular I had ever felt especially amongst strangers. My friends who didn’t go to the party even saw pictures of us in other people's pictures. If only the media were there!

What a memorable Halloween. Only a week ago, we had no ideas for a costume. With our triumph, I feel like we need to go every year and top what we had done the previous year. Halloween costume ideas are welcome!

Our Winnings Including The Biggest Bottle of Jack