Changing Flavors of Eid

Eid is the Muslim word for celebration and festivities. I have struggled with the various names for the two eids that I encounter in my Muslim culture and tradition (derived from Arabic terms as well as local cultural adaptations), unsure about which ones stand for the celebrations following Ramadan, a month of fasting, and which ones stand for the eid during the pilgrimage (hajj) season. Now all I do to avoid the confusion is to say this: “Eid-ul-Fitr should find you fitter!” This means that Eid-ul-Fitr is the one that follows fasting, and for this reason, people are fitter when this eid arrives. It is possible that often this is not the case, because some do tend to feast a lot in the evenings and this results in weight gain and poorer health. But the idea is to be fitter, to abstain from the relentless calling of your bodily self, and to nurture your spiritual self in the process through the judicious feeding of your body and mind, leaving one fitter physically as well as spiritually.

The eid in the pilgrimage season of “hajj” is referred to as “Eid-al-Adha” meaning “the festival of sacrifice”. Besides these, comparisons are brought into the nomenclature, and the “festival of sacrifice” (also called “bali perunnal” in Kerala and conveying the same meaning) is referred to as “the bigger eid”, and Eid-al Fitr is referred to as “the smaller eid”. ( I found the exact opposite comparative terms in the book “The Muslim Next Door“, adding to the confusion I already have!)

Religious celebrations bring to display the people who make up the community of the faithful. My community in that sense, has changed over the years from the time of my childhood in Kasaragod, Kerala, to now as a 43 year old, in Austin, Texas. It makes me think about how much my self-identification itself has undergone a gradual transformation by the sheer  necessity to adapt to new contexts and to find a semblance of wholeness and happiness. My faith has only deepened from an awareness of this transformation, for it rescues spirituality from the trappings of identity, and grounds it in its true  purpose- to provide meaning to our existence, to find in our selves compassion for others, to provide us with some foundational values that will facilitate better relationships with kith and kin, and the community at large,  leading us to love and peace, its priceless rewards!

Our conflicts and our suffering stems from our obsession with our selves, and in the larger social and political contexts, it is a similar self-obsession with group identifications that lie at the fault lines of conflict. God calls us to outgrow our narrow selves and grow towards a transcendental self. It is evident in the work of prophets who sought only to dampen the fault lines of identity, never to deepen them, even though they also did not call on them to abandon their identities completely. Such an abandonment is impossible when we consider the social nature of being human. There is enormous power to do good in coming together as a group, being connected by language, culture and values.  Without any identity to hold on to, one would scatter away like a frail and dry dandelion, at the blow of a light wind, just as at the individual level, without an ego, one would not have a vehicle to help the one transcend his/her ego! So, as long as we have a mortal self, we need our sense of self and identity. What is crucial within this reality is to understand that neither our sense of self nor our group identities are rigid concepts, that they are changing and that they need to change.

The month of Ramadan was a very busy one, which coincided with the end of the academic year for my children and the beginning of their summer break. They fasted through final examinations, and other school events. My youngest attended soccer practices while fasting, but skipped fasting on days when there were games. My husband lived through excruciating back pain that forced him to be off from work as well as fasting. And I spent many days learning Arabic with Asif Meherali‘s free video lessons  and Dr V Abdur Rahim’s Madinah Arabic Reader text books. There were outdoor iftars (breaking fasts) at the masjid, enjoying the beautiful weather. Two iftars were interfaith ones, when there were guests from other faiths. I got to break bread with catholic friends from my Sultan and Saint interfaith group,  and chat heartily through the hustle and bustle of a communal meal. There were also nightly Taraweeh prayers at the serene and cozy yoga studio that graciously opened its doors for Muslim Space. The Turkish imam incorporated a melodic song glorifying Allah in between the prayers, apart from the recital of salaats (blessings on the prophet) after each prayer. This “islamic choir” was quite enjoyable for a person like me who likes to sing , but has a bad voice and no musical sense!

A fitting end to Ramadan came in the form of a women’s qiyam night, with a visiting scholar from Karamah, that turned out be an energetic affair focused on women’s leadership. Women sprawled on the carpet and chairs, young and older, and listened to the presentation that cited misreadings from the Quran that limits women from leadership roles, and then reflected on how women need to overcome such hurdles. Ramadan in many ways is like the night of reflection before the dawn of a new day and more action. And call to action is certainly the message that was conveyed!

We spent the night before Eid rolling out little rice dumplings called “kadumbu”. I got my boys to do what I have done many times in my childhood. We would gather around a big pot of ground rice dough, and all of us would pinch from it a small lump for ourselves, from which we would then pinch out even smaller portions to roll out little elongated, cylindrical dumplings that would then be flattened with the help of a small pressure from our pinky fingers pressing on it sideways. It takes some practice to do all this within the area afforded by your own palm. I loved doing this. I would try to be perfect with the ones I made and would silently admire the ones I had made, somehow always finding a reason to believe that mine were better than the rest on the large plate where we dropped them all. These would all then be dropped into a giant steaming tray in a pot that is meant for such steamed food. The following morning, these dumplings would cook in a chicken curry to become a one pot dish and breakfast to feed a large family. This is what we had for breakfast too, on this Eid many years hence,  far away from Kasaragod where all this began!

I do not remember going for Eid prayers in Kasaragod. As I mentioned in a previous blog, there were no prayer accommodations for women then. Women would stay at home, change into new clothes, and supervise the kitchen, or work there themselves if help was not handy. When men returned from prayers, it would be time to go on a round of house visits to neighbors’ and relatives’ homes, which I loved doing for the sake of the eid snacks that we got to eat at each home, and the small pocket money that came our way as eid gift ( Eidi is a term that I heard only in my adult life in US. We used to call it “perunnal paisa” which literally just means “eid money”.) Then there were village fairs that we were taken to by our uncle.  Those trips meant toys – plastic dolls, and small wooden pots and pans with colorful bands enameled on them. But those fairs are memories from a very early age. For some reason, those fairs gradually phased out from the our Eid scene.( I don’t know why. )

Many years later, as a high school girl, eids were in a different town called Palakkad, which is about 7 hrs by train from Kasaragod. There we did go to the mosque for eid prayers, though it was not such a common thing for women to do even then. We met my mother’s friends there, who she worked with in small social projects as part of a women’s organization. I did not have many Muslim friends then, and the eid prayers were hurried obligations to be fulfilled.  In Palakkad,  eid became more about the time we spent together as a nuclear family because we did not have our relatives and the culture of Kasaragod there. My mother would spend most of the day cooking Biriyani, which would then be the highlight of the day. Sometimes we would go on short outdoor trips to the local Malambuzha dam and its attached gardens. Once we even attempted a half day trip to a hill station nearby! There was only time for the road trip with family friends of ours, a few pictures at sunset in the tea estate there, and a meal at a restaurant in the little town, after which we headed back home.

There was always the excitement of new clothes and accessories associated with Eid. This meant a few visits to the tailor who would sew our clothes for us, once to hand him the job, the material, and the measurements, then another visit to pick the finished product up.  And if we had not gotten around to such a commissioning, it would mean hasty shopping in the last week of Ramadan, getting in and out of small shops, looking for a perfect fit. A visit to the small accessory shop called “Just a Minute” would follow. Decking up to the best of our ability was something we always did for Eid.

My experience of eid has changed greatly over the years, and in United States, what I found was the question of how one should celebrate Eid? Eid prayers were now massive, global affairs where we saw traditional clothing of all kinds. There is always great aplomb in how people carry themselves in their traditional clothes here- especially the Africans. Some of the bright colors they wore reminded me of the bright colors in the Kerala “mundu”, a piece of cloth worn around the waist down, like a skirt, by men as well as women. My grandmother would call hers (and she had some very colorful ones)  just “thuni” meaning “cloth”. In the grand eid venues of United States, It seemed like I had no cultural clothing to speak for me. After all, my churidars were worn with so much flair by the Pakistanis and North Indians. Also, salwar kameez and churidars are very recent additions to the Kerala muslim culture. My mother wears saris, and this is what she is seen in on eid days, sometimes very simple cotton ones too. My grandmothers would have been seen in them too. Also, the size of my family had drastically come down, being away from family, and there was just my husband and I before we had the kids!  I remember  that we invited a friend who was living alone to have lunch with us on one of our earliest eids in US. Once we moved to Austin, we found ourselves being invited to large gatherings either for lunch or dinner through the few friends we made here. The crowd and the food would be desi, and there were some people I only met at those gatherings and never in between. The children would take day of from school when they were younger, but as they grew older  and got to high school, they have preferred to attend school rather than make up the missed lessons later. Once Ramadan began coinciding with the summer break, our eids have been during the vacation and we got to spend a few in Kerala too, like the one last year.

This Eid-ul-Fitr, we prayed at the spacious HEB center, and the khutba or sermon was geared towards the kids, based on the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and focused on the characteristic virtue of each superhero, that was then connected to an Islamic virtue derived from the scriptures. I smiled as I listened to it thinking that my boys would like it. Once we reunited as a family after the prayers that separated us gender wise, I found out that my oldest one thought that the imam had tried too hard and that it sounded a bit farfetched.  Still, he could not but admit that it was interesting, and a commendable effort on his part. We took a few family pictures standing amidst the eid crowd, and then shared them on WhatsApp family groups instantly.

We have been following our prayers with a short visit to coffee shops for many years now. We went to the airy and light ambience of the Taiwanese 85 degrees Bakery, where the golden color of baked goods always tantalize us and tempt us. The drinks were light and not too sweet. I stayed away from thoughts about health and environmentalism. The cups were plastic. The baked goods were made of  white processed flour.

After phone calls to family in India, and some freshening up, off we went to Mainevent for some bowling and games. It was a celebration organized by Muslim Space, as on the two eids prior to this one. We had pizza and drinks for lunch, and I got to chat with a few friends, and then also tire myself through many rounds of amateurish bowling, ice hockey and pool. Interacting with the Muslim Space crowd, that is mostly comprised of individuals raised in this country,  challenges me to understand their manners, language and culture, and forces me out from my comfort zone. Its an ongoing process of learning and growing in the spirit of inclusiveness and diversity, and the friendships are dear ones in the making. In the evening, I found myself once again in the company of my desi friends, some very old and dear ones, almost family,  and others I have been meeting for many years at eid gatherings and masjid iftars. We hung around over biriyani and chicken tikka masala. We played a cheerful game of white elephant and then it was time to wrap up the day.

With so many disparate elements, my eid is nothing but a cultural hodgepodge. Authenticity is not something I pursue anymore, simply because there is nothing that we can call authentic when it comes to cultural matters. Every point in time is built on what came before. My life seems to be in a flux, and I wonder if it is good? Is there unhappiness ahead, an uprooting? Or is it freedom that awaits me?

Like the silvery dandelion, dry and frail, scatter I must. But I ask this: when the dandelion, trapped in sunlight and flailed by the wind, finally gets scattered, is it not also because it has come of age? Is it not because it has finally been released to embrace much more than the ground that grew it?