With the winter festivities just around the corner, many Mustangs are wrapped up in the excitement and anticipation that the holidays bring. Some might still be gorging themselves on Halloween candy, but not many people think about the minuscule holidays such as Lame Duck Day and National Weatherman’s Day. “The Carnival in Brazil is probably the craziest [holiday I have heard of]. I have never really heard of any strange holidays,” sixth grader Rakshinee Screekan said. In fact, almost every day is dedicated to a certain thing, which can vary from straw bears to cats. Many hilarious holidays also have crazy stories behind them to match their absurd names.

Many festivals around the world have bright colors, good food, and happiness everywhere. Tinku, a village in Bolivia, has put a slight twist on your traditional carnival. The main attraction that many participants take part in is punching each other in the face. They do this to sacrifice blood to their goddess Pachamama, who said that if they sacrificed blood, it would bring forth a good harvest. Perhaps their eagerness to satisfy this request got a bit out of hand.

Another holiday that happens to be completely out of control is La Tomatina. Celebrated in Spain, it consists of one giant food fight, using tomatoes. No one is quite sure how this tradition started, but many are glad that it did. Some celebrators say that it was a form of protest, while others believe that it was a over-turned tomatocart. Whatever the reason, many satisfy their urge to splatter others with tomatoes during this festivity.

La Tomatina is not the only holiday that goes insane with food. In Thailand, citizens of the village Lopburi donate tons of fruit and other delectable snacks for a huge monkey buffet, held for all the primates that live around and in Lopburi. This holiday started because the monkeys around the village were feisty and started to steal food from visitors and villagers alike. The only way the villagers could think to stop this behavior is to throw a huge feast for the primates, and that is how it has happened, every year on the last weekend in November.

Students celebrate many different and exotic holidays. And if you think about it, many of the holidays we celebrate in the United States would probably sound just as crazy to people from other countries as their holidays do to us. Halloween is people dressing up in wacky costumes going from door to door, asking for candy. An old Christmas tradition is buying a tree, putting it in your living room, and decorating it with lights and ornaments. Holidays like La Tomatina may sound absurd to many in the U.S., but it’s just another thing for the people who celebrate it to look forward to, not to question the craziness of. Enjoy the holidays while they last!