July 6th, 2016, marked the end of Ramadan fasting with the Eid ul Fitr festival. Ramadan is my favorite month of the Islamic year. During Ramadan Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset, offer extra prayers at night, read Quran as much as possible, and give money and food in charity to the less fortunate. The purpose of doing all this is to achieve greater piety, discipline, self control and generosity.
On Eid morning, I was exhausted from the chand raat party (moon sighting) we attended the night before, but still managed to wake up early and got our Eid outfits ready, took a shower, and woke up hub to take a shower also. The Eid prayer and khutba (sermon), which was expected to be attended by around 2000 people, was held at the local high school playground at 9AM. They asked everyone to be there before 8:30, because finding parking could become an issue. Kiki was still sleeping and had no plans for waking up, as the previous night’s party had worn her out. I decided to stay with her and hub left for the prayer without me. Taking advantage of my alone time, I made phone calls to my family to wish them Happy Eid while making breakfast. I decorated the table with flowers and a fresh fruit display. I also baked some of hub’s favorite desserts, some paratha and an omelet for Kiki. Hub called me on his way home and I started the tea pot because we love our tea fresh and hot. While Kiki was still sleeping, we ate breakfast, chatted about the prayer service and then sipped on our favorite tea afterwards.
I had ordered our traditional Eid outfits from a Pakistani designer and wanted good pictures in them, so, I scheduled a mini photoshoot at the mall studio for the afternoon. However, Kiki refused to wear the outfit I planned for her, so we went with a backup dress. All three of us were excited and made silly faces and silly sounds hoping the photographer would capture those moments. I was happy that it wasn’t just a photoshoot session, but also a time for our family bonding. I picked up the pictures’ cd a few days ago and some of the shots are among my all time favorites.
To finish the Eid ul Fitr festival, I organized an evening Eid party for around 20 families at an event hall with the help of two other friends. We arrived early to receive food from the caterers, arrange seats, decorate tables with tablecloths and beautiful centerpieces, and hung up Eid decorations - some of which we made ourselves and some we ordered from Amazon’s Eid shop. For kids entertainment, we had magic show, face painting and Elsa, the princess, from the movie Frozen. There were many games for adults too, but I enjoyed karaoke the most. Jawad and I sang our favorite Urdu songs and laughed so hard when we made mistakes. Everyone admired the arrangements and thanked us for our efforts. My friends and I had planned this event for weeks and were glad to see it turned out to be a great success.
