Al-Eid Mubarak!

For those who don’t follow the Muslim calendar of festivals, Eid al-Kabir (the big celebration) was on Monday November 7; but just like for Christmas, there was much to do before the big day.  The goal of this blog entry is to how much effort goes into this annual sacrifice that only lasts a few minutes, but takes days to prepare.  So without further adieu, here is the countdown to Eid Al-Kabir.

4 Days utill Eid (Thursday Nov. 3): Mama Nezha went out to a souk on the outskirts of Rabat and bought our sheep along with a sheep for her daughter Omnia’s family and for her sister Merriam’s family.  When I got home that night after teaching English, Amine, my host brother, took down into the basement of the apartment building to show me our sheep.  I think we were the first in the apartment building to have gotten our sheep, because that night there were only 3 sheep in the medium-sized storage closet, but on Eid at least 5 or 6 sheep came out of that room, one at a time to be sacrificed.

No, this isn't a sign of the Apocalypse; it's just
a few young Moroccans burning off the hair
of sheep heads in the middle of the street the day after Eid.

3 Days utill Eid (Friday Nov. 4): I drove up to Tangier with my program for the weekend to see the northern part of Morocco, which was under the Spanish protectorate, not the French.  The Eid preparations weren’t very visible in the modern part of the city, which the Europeans had built while the city still had its international status before Morocco gained independence in 1956, largely because it was raining.  As a side note on Tangier, my first impression of the city was underwhelming – it felt like the city was inhabited by “foreigners” (i.e. Moroccans) trying to find a new identity after the “native” builders of the city (i.e. Europeans) fled once Morocco gained control of the city.

2 Days utill Eid (Saturday Nov. 5): Once I actually walked around in the Medina (the old Moroccan part of the city) I finally saw all the sheep and hay bales I was expecting to find.  You could feel the excitement in the air as everyone was busy buying their sheep, sharpening their knifes, and acquiring their charcoal for the big feast.  The most memorable example was watching a group of young Moroccan kids going crazy over a sheep someone had just bought – some were helping to push it (since sheep can be very obstinate when they’re 1) by themselves and 2) about to be killed) while others were busy pointing out to us the sheep that was obviously there.  But the Eid madness didn’t end there.  Later that day we set off for Chefchaouen, a town tucked away in the Rif Mountains southeast of Tangier, and sat in a virtual parking lot for 2 hours in Tetouan because of the huge sheep market that was being held.  So as we sat in our bus inching forward, both on and sometimes off the road, a steady stream of people with newly purchased goats and sheep trickled past us; a few of the sheep willingly went along, but most of them had to be pushed, pulled, yanked, or even carried.  Finally, after a 6 hour bus ride that should only have taken 4 we made it to Chefchaouen, which means “Look! Two horns” for the horn-shaped mountain range the town’s built around.   

Eid dinner: sheep stomach tajine with several side salads, olives,
and of course, bread

1 Day until Eid (Sunday Nov. 6): Unsurprisingly, Eid preparations were also occurring in Chefchaouen – there; there were so many sheep and so much hay all over the medina that one couldn’t go five steps witout running into some reminder of the approaching Eid.  The strangest reminder of Eid in Chefchaouen was listening to an imam preach the story of Eid al-Kabir (in English) on the steps of a nearby mosque while I and afew friends ate lunch.  His enthusiasm of trying to include foreigners in the Eid without hesitation was a theme that was also present in my host family when I got home that night after another 6 hour bus ride delayed by village sheep markets.  The moment my host mom opened the door to our apartment that night, the excitement of the approaching Eid washed over me.  It was the same feeling of the night before Thanksgiving and Christmas of anxious anticipation for the holiday to start, and the feeling was so familiar that for a few hours I almost felt like I was back home celebrating Christmas with my family in Minnesota – the oven was busy baking bread, the stove was sizzling with beghrir (Moroccan pancakes) for breakfast the next day, and the kids (Hussam [6] and Yassine [1.5]) were running around telling me how we were going to kill the sheep tomorrow morning.  Then at around 11pm everyone went to bed so we could get up early to get a head start on the Eid festivities.

Al-Eid Mubarak! (Monday Nov. 7): The big day started bright and early at 7am with breakfast and my family’s morning prayers.  Breakfast was bigger than usual because family is so important in Morocco, especially during Eid, that my host sister, her husband, Yassine, and Hussam had spent the night (and would stay 3 more nights after that) even though they lived in the neighborhood next to us.  Then at about 9am the first sheep was dragged into the courtyard, its throat was cut, its skin was removed before I even realized it had started.  Thankfully for me our sheep was only the first of 8 to be sacrificed in the courtyard.  As the morning dragged on, the other families from the apartment slowly trickled out into the courtyard to kill their sheep and help out everyone else kill and clean the sheep and their innards.  The rest of the day continued at a leisurely Christmas Day pace, with liver and heart brochettes for lunch and 2 huge sheep stomach tajines for dinner at my host aunt’s house.  If you can get over the strange foods and the smell of dead sheep and blood, Eid truly is a wonderful holiday.