Literally Time to Eat!

What comes after Ramadan? Eid! For those who don’t know what Ramadan and Eid are. It’s a very spiritual time for Muslims across the globe. A billion Muslims every year participate in what is revered to be a time of peace, self reflection, religion, community and most importantly, charity (zakat as it is called).

During Ramadan, we fast for a month- so from sundown to sunset, we do not eat or drink.  We eat and drink at sunrise, and then break our fast at sunset. This year was particularly hard, since it was about 18 hours of no eating or drinking. It was difficult to say the least. But we hold steady in our conviction to pursue God and his favor by giving away what we would have eaten or drank. That plays into the charity. After the month of Ramadan is over, Muslims then celebrate in the largest food festival on Earth: Eid.

Imagine 1 billion people coming together and just eating? Yeah, it’s a party alright! It is a celebration of completing starving and thirsting yourself into being a more pious and patient person.

If you have never known what it feels like for a person in a 3rd world country to go hungry for a week without food and water- well Ramadan is that reminder, that you should be grateful, that you should give back and remember those who cannot eat or drink. To thank God almighty, for the favors he has given you. You’re life may not be perfect, but you were lucky enough to be born a person who is wealthy enough to be reading this on the Internet.

Eid is the time for families to visit, to come together and share food, and love. To bless each other and to pray for those who have completed Ramadan and for those who could not due to health conditions or other circumstances.

Since I am Fijian born Canadian, our family does Eid a little differently than what other Muslims from the Middle East would consider normal. It’s not a bad thing, it’s actually pretty cool- but tiring.

We go pray Eid prayer in the morning, come back home, deck out in our nicest outfits, prepare the gifts we will be presenting to family; and head on out! We go from family to family house, sometimes up to 20 houses when I was younger.  Sit and talk, and eat delicious food! You legit gain back whatever you lost during Ramadan (if you lost any weight).

This time is a fun time for kids! They get what’s called “eidie”. Usually money or presents! They love it. Back in my day, I would cash in about $130. Not too shabby 🙂

This year though, we only did about 5 houses. The weather was simply too hot, and the kids were getting very sugared up and very tired. Haytham missed his nap and was over loaded on sugary snacks, but he did pretty well.

My aunts get together every year and do their Eid Open House together in one place. Which is extremely helpful. My kids remembered from the previous year that they have a kids station, with fun things to do and goodie bags! They could only focus on it! So it was our first house!

For our Open Eid House, we did it at my wonderful mothers house again with my lovely sister in law. With the kids at home, I still somehow managed to make Korean style BBQ chicken with lettuce wraps. Strawberry rice krispies (I’m somewhat of a expert in making rice krispies) And coconut oil fried Chinese style chicken wings! My mom and my sister in law did the brunt of the cooking though.

They made beef curry, peas with potato curry, with puri (a deep fried small roti) Indian sweets like lado and barfee, to western classics like Lemon roll cake, macaroons made by “BakeTillYouBreak”, to berry cheesecakes made by my sister in law! Yeah, we went all out!

If you want to get cakes done, check out BakeTillYouBreak on instragram– this girl is only 14 years ago and crazy talented!

We did it outdoors again this year simply because it’s HOT OUTSIDE! We also decorated it festively!

Omera was patiently waiting for kids to come, but not many came.  Because this year our Open House was on July 1st- Canada’s 150th birthday….what were we thinking!? But still it was a fun night for the kids. They got to eat tons of junk food, and played the whole day outside. Omera even got a sleep over at her grandparents house.

By the end of the night, Haytham was so exhausted, he couldn’t last the 2 minutes it takes to drive from my mothers house to our home.

At the end of the night when I was reviewing all the footage, I regretted horribly for not changing the settings on my camera to do a better job of recording the night time sparklers fun! >_< Alas, there’s always next year right.

All in all, the food, the family, the sparklers and fun; it was a great night! Next year, I will plan better for sure!

Looking forward to Ramadan 2018 🙂

See you next time!

~ ~ Lazina ~ ~