Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Eid Al-AdHa

Happy Thanksgiving and Eid Mubarek Sayyid to everyone!


Last Saturday was eid al-adha or the feast of the sacrifice here in Morocco and across the Muslim world. In commemoration of Abraham's (Ibrahim's) willingness to sacrifice his son Ishmael, Muslims come together to spend time with family and celebrate with their families. In addition eid al-adha, being the feast of the sacrifice, involves the sacrificial killing of either a goat, cow or, most typically a sheep. I was invited to spend the eid in Fes with a good friend of mine, Atman, and his family. In addition to being treated to four days of excellent, delicious and more than plentiful home cooking by his mother, it was a great treat to get to return to the wonderful city of Fes and experience again it in a festive mood. It was a great weekend replete with a day trip into the beautiful mountains around Fes, particularly to the pretty mountain town of Ifrane where all of the trees were in full fall splendor, and with the exciting Real Madrid-Barca game which meant that every cafe across Morocco was packed with excited fans. And yes, we did indeed sacrifice a ram as you all have no doubt surmised from the picture. At least for me it was initially surprising how blasé the people around me were about the sacrifice. Although it was clear that certain members of the family preferred not to take part it was also clear that this was, for the most part, not that exciting--after all it takes place every year.

We had quite a bit of rain overnight in Fes but by the time I returned to Rabat the weather was once again gorgeous if a bit chilly.