Proud buyers of two camels towing them home for the Eid sacrifice
Monday, January 24, 2005
Friday, January 21, 2005
It's Eid
Eid is an event that everyone is excited about till it finally arrives. On Eid the males get up and prepare for the mass prayer. Usually new and traditional clothes are worn. The prayer is held in several mosques and open spaces at different times. The grandest congregation is in the historic Badshahi Mosque. Since I live in the Cantonment and getting to Badshahi Mosque means having to go through congested street and heavy traffic, I walk down to the nearby PAF Stadium for an open air affair. There are still a couple of acquaintances from my Air Force days who pray there and we get to see each other.
The prayer is the shortest of all prayers in Islam but the sermon and post prayer recital elongate the event to about just under an hour. The maulana finds himseld on top of the world while addressing the largest congregation of the year. He yells, shouts and screams thinking that his voice must reach the last man. The fact that he is being helped by an electronic gadget (amplifier and speakers) has still not dawned upon him. I guess he thinks shouting is proportionate to the amount of power he believes he has that morning. After the prayer everyone greetings friends and fellows and returns home.
The Eid breakfast is singular in content. You get only one course; vermicelli with boiling milk and sugar to taste. Some richen it with a little cream and an ilaichi or two for enhancing the flavour. This is usually followed by a gift giving activity. Most people prefer to give cash and those receiving are only too happy to receive the same. On this Eid, the men get busy again or begin the wait for the butcher who cuts the sacrificed animal into desired portions. The meat is to be divided into three parts; one for the poor, one for friends and relatives and one for oneself. The day is taken up in distributing and receiving meat.
By afternoon, everyone is tired and many older folks surrender to an afternoon nap.
Eid become quite a boring day as it progresses. There is little community activity. Its just another holiday to be whiled away. The children have their fun with the money that they get and the new clothes they wear. Some families take to visiting the whole clan. This is a very tiresome activity the chief gain of which is the large number of calories one collects in the process. Dinners are not popular on Eid. Most people enjoy quiet dinners at home.
This time it rained on Eid; luckily the rain started after the prayer. We are quite unprepared for the operating in rainy conditions. Eid was thus even more static than what it usually is. Thank Allah it does not snow here - people might not even go for the morning prayer in such a case. But all said and done, we await the next Eid.
The prayer is the shortest of all prayers in Islam but the sermon and post prayer recital elongate the event to about just under an hour. The maulana finds himseld on top of the world while addressing the largest congregation of the year. He yells, shouts and screams thinking that his voice must reach the last man. The fact that he is being helped by an electronic gadget (amplifier and speakers) has still not dawned upon him. I guess he thinks shouting is proportionate to the amount of power he believes he has that morning. After the prayer everyone greetings friends and fellows and returns home.
The Eid breakfast is singular in content. You get only one course; vermicelli with boiling milk and sugar to taste. Some richen it with a little cream and an ilaichi or two for enhancing the flavour. This is usually followed by a gift giving activity. Most people prefer to give cash and those receiving are only too happy to receive the same. On this Eid, the men get busy again or begin the wait for the butcher who cuts the sacrificed animal into desired portions. The meat is to be divided into three parts; one for the poor, one for friends and relatives and one for oneself. The day is taken up in distributing and receiving meat.
By afternoon, everyone is tired and many older folks surrender to an afternoon nap.
Eid become quite a boring day as it progresses. There is little community activity. Its just another holiday to be whiled away. The children have their fun with the money that they get and the new clothes they wear. Some families take to visiting the whole clan. This is a very tiresome activity the chief gain of which is the large number of calories one collects in the process. Dinners are not popular on Eid. Most people enjoy quiet dinners at home.
This time it rained on Eid; luckily the rain started after the prayer. We are quite unprepared for the operating in rainy conditions. Eid was thus even more static than what it usually is. Thank Allah it does not snow here - people might not even go for the morning prayer in such a case. But all said and done, we await the next Eid.
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