The writer, Suruchi is a non practicing lawyer with a Degree in Masters of Law and is also a visiting faculty in the Mumbai University. Mom of two boys, a self confessed shopaholic, an avid reader, and a blogger who loves penning down her zillion thoughts on life, parenting and everyday happenings.
Festivals in our house are an unimaginable mish- mash of tradition, rituals, culture and our very own brand of secularism. Every multi cultural family will usually have their own version of any festival, which is in sync and sensitive to all cultures. The ongoing Ganesh festival is celebrated with great gusto in my mothers house, and obviously all of us participate. This year there are bonus celebrations as Bakri Eid falls smack in the middle of it all.
I am often asked how I explain the difference between the two cultures to my kids. I get this question a LOT! And not always the polite version. At weddings or in any social gatherings people take it upon themselves to quiz my family about the tradition and rituals specific to the Muslim community. My standard answer to all these inquisitive people is that we do not ‘teach’ our children the differences, we teach them the similarities. We only point out the common grounds. Although it’s an extremely difficult task considering that my audience is 3 and 6 years old!
Recently I found myself telling my younger son that on ‘Bakri Eid we need to wake up early in the morning and he needs to go with his brother and father to offer the Eid namaz. After which we will head to his grandmother’s house for Ganesh aarti.’ All was well upto this point. Right up to when my older son came running into the room with a plastic knife in his hand saying ‘mamma I’m going to help papa cut the goat with this!’.
My baby boy was completely confused and turned to tell me the sequence of events the way he understood it. Namaz , then grandmother’s house, and then then cut a goat? I started explaining that the offering to the Gods differ. But before I could he stopped me and said, “The way Ganpati Bappa loves modak, Allah Tala loves goats?” I smiled, at his age he had understood the concept perfectly for his level of comprehension.
Last year was the first time my older son went with his father for Qurbani. I was extremely worried and wondered how he would deal with it. Would it disturb him? Will he be scared? I spent a sleepless night worrying about a complete non event. My husband did an excellent job of explaining that the sacrifice was a smaller aspect of a greater good, and how the meat from the goats that we sacrifice will feed numerous families. World over, millions of tonnes of meat is distributed amongst the poor. Values of sharing, charity and taking care of the needy are best imbibed from a young age through these meaningful but fun festivals.
It is a popular misconception that animal sacrifice is exclusive only to Islam, many Hindu communities too begin all their auspicious occasions with animal sacrifice. The point I’m trying to make is, the underlying principles of every religion and culture are the same, we only need to train ourselves and the kids to spot and understand them. ‘Cultural differences’ is an alien term in our house because these very differences make us what we are. Sure it does lead to a lot of confusion, sometimes hilarious and sometimes downright embarrassing situations. Like when my 3 year old asked my Hindu Brahmin mother if she would like to eat the bakri eid prasad, aka goat! Or when my older one, asked my husband’s muslim aunt while she was offering her Jumma Namaz, when she would sing “shendur laal chadhayo“!
Though embarrassing I step back and look at the larger picture. Our kids are learning that all religions are basically similar with rituals differing a little, we may all have different names for him, but there’s one God, and there maybe various festivals but they all bring us tremendous joy, happiness, and love.
They will grow up seeing no difference between qurbani and prasad, Eid or Ganpati, Allah or Bhagwan or Christ. And in our house, Eid like any other festival, for us, means food, fun, family, and feasts. We all live with our different similarities, and our similar differences, and in our home we love it all modaks or lamb chops, sheera or biryani. Every festival is just an excuse for another celebration!
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