Eid mubarak!

Today is the first day of Eid al-Fitr ("festival of the breaking of the fast"), the three-day festival commemorating the end of Ramadan and the biggest celebration in the Muslim year. It's been a little weird, because since Ramadan ends on the sighting of the new moon, nobody is quite sure when Eid starts until the night before. This year most people planned on it starting tomorrow, but the new moon was sighted in neighboring countries last night so the Qatari committee in charge of Eid declared that it starts today. Good thing we finished the Qur'an a day early, Nikkinana! Not everyone was so lucky; apparently a lot of government officials are out of the country on holiday and just discovered that they won't have Wednesday and Thursday off work like they expected. Oops.

Apparently the stores were crammed full of people last night buying their Eid finery; it's traditional to buy all new clothes at the end of Ramadan and wear them on the first day of Eid; henna mendhi is also rampant. (I'm currently wearing a swimsuit and my Montana Logging and Ballet Company T-shirt, but that's because we just got back from the pool. Ah, the trials of November in Qatar.) The tradition for Eid is to go to the mosque early in the morning and then spend most of the day visiting all one's family members, friends and acquaintances. Everyone exchanges cards, often containing cash, instead of gifts; it's not a lot of cash, but it adds up for excited small children! There is also an incredible amount of entertainment for six evenings; tonight we're going to Aladdin's Kingdom to see the Chinese State Circus and all kinds of other fun things.

The United Arab Emirates are officially not celebrating Eid this year, because they are still in the eight-day mourning period for their late president. They take this quite seriously: earlier this week the head of the Abu Dhabi television network was fired for resuming normal programming before the eight days were up. Still, I felt really bad for all the Emirati children when I heard eid was cancelled there; it's like cancelling Christmas!

Luckily, we didn't have to worry about that here in Qatar, because there is only a three-day mourning period when the president of another Muslim nation dies.

...president of another Muslim nation...

...three days of mourning...

...wait a second...

...yup, you guessed it. Qatar is still in mourning for Yasser Arafat, so according to the local paper, while the festivities at Aladdin's Kingdom are still on (what else are they going to do with the Chinese State Circus?), the nightly fireworks displays will probably be cancelled. Bummer.

Nevertheless, eid mubarak (blessed celebration!) to all our friends & family out there! Sorry we can't drop in with cards full of cash. :-)

(Pronunciation note for Mum: EED al-FIT-rr. And EED moo-BAR-ack.)

Send in the clowns

As an addendum to my previous post: we had fireworks after all! So much for mourning Arafat! (At least, unlike our quasi-neighbors to the northeast, we did not celebrate annual anti-Israel day in his honor.)

The Chinese State Circus was really good -- not as slick as Cirque du Soleil, but a lot of fun nonetheless. And it was exciting, generally, to be out celebrating the eid with an enormous number of people from around the world. I think I've mentioned this already, but one of the really amazing things about living in Qatar is the diversity of the people here. Tonight people were dressed in their newest best finery, and it was quite a parade of crisp thobes, sparkling abayas, Bedouin gold, salwar kameez, saris, robes, turbans, headscarves of every conceivable color.... Normally at a circus the performers stick out because of their outlandish and colorful garb, but not so in Doha! It's difficult to find any way of dressing that somebody here doesn't normally adopt. (The female clown with two large balloons in her shirt managed, though.)

Another favorite of mine was the group of stilt-walkers marching around the amusement park with a marching band playing Stars and Stripes Forever. What was that about?