Thoughts on my English class's first "real" Halloween

I thought last Friday's "smashing" time with my Jack piñata would be the highlight, but my students did me one better. One guy manage to find a small pumpkin and carve it into a Jack O' Lantern as a present for his homesick English teacher. Then I scared the class by telling them Long Black Veil, the eery 1959 saga song by Lefty Frizzell, a country recording favorite with the man in black himself, Johnny Cash. Finally, I asked the class to write me some ghost stories as their weekend writing homework. Wow! The Chinese are naturals! I've just read some truly scary stories, some based on Chinese legends, others set in darkened hospital corridors or spooky classrooms after dark. It really doesn't matter that the grammar's a bit off. They're so good I'm going to create an anthology of the class tales. I might even ask the good artists in class to do some illustrations.
I'm glad they got into the "spirit" of the day, rather than simply seeing it as some sort of incomprehensible Western retail event. It's a lot more than simply a chance to buy an orange down jacket.