Happy Eid! (and host family updates)

The past few days have been part of Eid al-Adha, the Muslim holiday celebrating the end of the Hajj, which is the annual pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia.


However, things have been pretty hectic around here because I switched host families on Thursday (Nov. 26th). The switch was due to various reasons, but I have been very happy the past few days staying with my temporary host family, so I am glad I finally spoke up and made the switch, even though I was really nervous about it. I will stay with this temporary family for about two weeks until the AFS-Egypt program finds a permanent family to host me for the rest of the year, insha'allah (this phrase means "God willing," and Egyptians use it ALL the time, so it has found its way into all the exchange students' vocabulary).


On Friday morning, I went with my host family to the mosque for the morning prayer, which was really interesting, and I had to cover my head in a scarf like all the Egyptian women do for prayer. We walked back to their apartment, which is actually very near my previous host family's apartment, and then watched a butcher kill three sheep!


The sheep - 'kharuuf' in Arabic - had been living in an enclosed area next to the apartment for a couple nights, and on Friday morning, the butcher came over and literally cut their throats, skinned them, cut up the meat, and threw it in these plastic buckets right there in front of us. He then took the bucket up to the apartment where my host mom sorted through it, put some in the freezer, and then started cooking some on the stove for us to eat later that day. They gave the other kharuuf to their aunt, and the third was for the poor people.


It was quite a spectacle, and I was pretty disgusted, but it was also fascinating how the butcher and his assistant did everything. They waited until most of the blood drained out from the sheep's neck, and then they cut a whole in the sheep's hind leg, and one man blew air into the leg to fill up the abdomen of the sheep while another used a stick to whack the abdomen to separate the meat from the skin. Then, they dragged the kharuuf over to a doorway and hung it from its hind legs while the butcher skinned it and cut off all the meat.

He threw out the intestines, kidneys, bladder, etc., but kept a lot of other organs that we don't normally eat in the U.S.

We basically spent the next two days eating kharuuf, fatha - a rice dish mixed with soggy bread pieces that was actually pretty good, sleeping, and visiting relatives. We spent a lot of time at their relatives' apartments, which was a lot of fun. Everyone was so welcoming, and it was such a happy celebration...and it was such a change compared to my old host family. I was also amazed by how much Egyptians talk! Sometimes so many conversations were going on at once in the same room that the noise level rose to shouting. There was definitely a lot of joking and laughing involved, too. After dinner on Friday the family set up speakers in the living room, and we all took turns dancing, even the parents! Unfortunately, I haven't learned how to dance Egyptian-style yet - it involves a lot of hip-shaking and hand movements, and is really fun to watch.


I slept in until noon for three days in a row, and I went to see a movie at the CityStars Mall on Sunday night - it was packed because everyone was going to the cinema for Eid. I went shopping on Monday afternoon with Izzy and my host sister, so it's been a relaxing vacation! I also went to the hairdresser on Friday morning with my two host sisters and got my hair curled for the first time ever, so I was shocked with how it turned out, but it has grown on me...it only cost five dollars, too.

I don't go back to work until Sunday (Dec. 6th), so it's a pretty long break, and I hope to visit Khan il-Khalili, the huge bazaar in Islamic Cairo, as well as the Citadel, by the end of the week. The Dahab trip was cancelled due to safety concerns from the American Embassy, but I'm really hoping it will be rescheduled sometime soon because I was really looking forward to that!

So Happy Eid, and I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving, too!

P.S. Since I switched host families, please do not send any more letters to that address...and I will unfortunately probably not receive any letters that you sent to that address.

And I apologize for the lack of pictures, but they wouldn't upload properly on this computer, so I will try to post them later or from a different computer if I get the chance.