Thank God for allowing me to survive my worst Eid in my life

Thank You Allah for allowing me to survive my worst Eid in my life.

On the Eid day, at the Mosque, after the initial Takbir and preaches, I stand up to pray the Eid prayers together with others behind the Imam. Suddenly I felt uneasiness, somewhat giddy or atypical vertigo and I have to control myself not to fall down or fainted.  But I got an almost a total thought-block and need to concentrate a lot with some difficulty to remember that I have to say the definite “Niat” or my aim and objective of that prayers.

Burmese Muslims’ way of celebrating Eid

In Burma/Myanmar, Eid ul-Fitr lasts for only one day of celebration for the Burmese Muslims. We call this day as Eid Nei’ (Nei’=day) or Eid Ka Lay (Ka Lay=small) or Shai Mai Eid (because Shai Mai or sayviah/ sweet vermicelli served with fried cashews, coconut shreds, raisins with milk is the main Burmese Muslim traditional food cooked during the Burmese Muslim Eids).
Although it is never a gazetted public holiday in Myanmar, most of the bosses have an understanding on the Burmese Muslims and usually even willing to give an unrecorded holiday to the Muslim staff. And they even used to take time off during the office hour to visit their Muslim staff usually also accompanied by other non-Muslim staff under them.

Eidi or Duit Raya or gift of some money to children during Eid or Hari Raya

When I was very young, in the primary school in Kalaw, we did not have any relatives there. But there were a lot of Muslims even in our road, so we went to all the Muslim houses in our road to get Eidi. Most of them give fifty cents coins or one Kyat. Few of them just give sweets and some invited us to eat food, usually Samai or Sawai. I hate  Samai or Sawai since that time because even few cents of money was better for us. I used to like Samai or Sawai when I grew up. Later when we shifted to Mandalay, we have a lot of relatives and could even get more than 100.00 Kyats. (At that time that was even dozens of times more valuable than the present Ringgit Malaysia. But I never spent even one cent from that money but given to my mother for the save keeping which I never asked back. My younger brother would resist my mother to give to her for safe keeping of that Eidi. When I look back the past, I feel sad that I feel bad (maybe I am wrong) although I tried to win the love of my parents, I failed. Both of them love my younger brothers more than me.

l’Aïd el-Fitr – Eid ul-Fitr – عيد الفطر

l’Aïd el-Fitr – Eid ul-Fitr – عيد الفطر (Arabic: عيد الفطر ‘Īdu ul-Fiṭr‎), often abbreviated to Eid, is a Muslim holiday that marks the end of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting. Eid is an Arabic word meaning “festivity”, while Fiṭr means “to break fast”; and so the holiday symbolizes the breaking of the fasting period. It is celebrated after the end of the Islamic month of Ramadan, on the first day of Shawwal.

Eid ul-Fitr lasts for three days of celebration and is sometimes also known as the “Smaller Eid” (Arabic: العيد الصغير al-‘īdu ṣ-ṣaghīr‎) as compared to the Eid ul-Adha that lasts four days and is called the “Greater Eid” (Arabic: العيد الكبير al-‘īdu l-kabīr‎).

Muslims are commanded by the Qur’an to complete their fast on the last day of Ramadan and then recite the Takbir all throughout the period of Eid^{[Qur’an 2:185 (Translated by Shakir)]}.

Burmese Muslim traditional food during Eid or Hari Raya

During the Eid, the tradition in our parents’ home is to cook Danpauk  or the Burmese Biryani. I used to encourage or request my wife to cook Danpauk in almost every Eid or Hari Raya. Now she had perfected the recipe of cooking Burmese Biryani and I believe she became the expert and her Biryani is the best in the world, according to my taste. She had modified to reduce oil, butter, sugar and colour from the point of view of healthy eating habit.

When I was young, my father would slaughter the chicken and all the elders, my mother, uncle Ko Tin Maung and I helped. But I have to clean the inside and outside of the house, dusted the show case cabinet where we kept the souvenirs and toys. (Our parents bought the expensive toys for us when we are ill or if our father came back from out station esp. Rangoon.) Later all the toys are kept in the show case and if we are ill only we are allowed to play with them.)

During the Eid, mother used to cook/bake the (Sa–Nwin–Ma–Kin) or Burmese Semolina Cake or (Kuih) Suchi, using Suchi, eggs and milk. This is also my favourite food.

In addition to that Shai mai or Samai or Shai Mai is also like the favourite sweet food for most of the Burmese Muslims.

Eid Mubarak English Song and Malay songs