This week was a much awaited vacation at home for Eid celebrations.
The three days of Ramadan were a blur. All I remember is now terribly hot it was (46 degrees Celsius, folks). True to my expectations, the moon was sighted on 29th of Ramadan.
I stayed awake all night, not much by choice because we generally tend to spend the night preparing for Eid next day. I am extra special and I cannot sleep so… Anyway, after two hours of sleep, the day of Eid began – just as hot and humid as any other day.
‘Cause for the first time in forever
There’ll be music, there’ll be light
For the first time in forever
I’ll be dancing through the night
That’s the song from Frozen. It has nothing to do with the Eid celebrations, except it was the first time of something.
For the first time, I wore a gharara. I have been wanting and asking Ammi for a gharara for as long as I could remember. She has caved, finally because gharara is in fashion nowadays. That means that I am not wearing anything different, but my childhood dream has finally come true.
It looks great and it feels great, except that the scorching weather made it almost impossible to breathe. The day is spent in meeting and greeting Eid to friends and families.
The next day, my married sisters visited us to celebrate the second day of Eid – Eid ki basi is generally an excuse for married women to visit their maika. It was madness. My niece is a year old, my nephew is a year and a half, and older ones are devilish. They were here for six hours flat but made the adults weepy, almost.
The third day of Eid, we were invited at my uncle’s place. I don’t like visiting others but my dad gets really upset if I say no. I am a good daughter, obviously so I obliged and spent 2.5 hours at uncle’s place. That was also madness because there were other set of devilish kids present. What is it with kids and their incessant need to slap around elders? If it is a generation kids thing, k don’t get it. Poor upbringing of kids I would say.
The fourth day, today, was huge. For one, it was the first rain of the season here at my native place Kamptee. And secondly, my phuphi’s son, my cousin got married. I don’t like attending weddings either but again was obligated to go. I wore my Eid gharara and it garnered a lot of praises and compliments – the gharara, not me, bit it made my day.
Tomorrow will be the last day of vacation. We start for Pune. We need to attend the Walima reception and get packing. It is going to be crazy.
I will see you next week.
Shabana Mukhtar
