Eid Mubarak!

hello! today is a BIG holiday in Bangladesh and in all Islam - it is Eid. More specifically, today is Eid ul Fitr, which is the first day of a new month on the lunar calendar, and the end of a month's worth of Ramadan sun-up-to-sun-down fasting (the purpose of Islamic fasting is for experiencing the suffering of the poor, and emphathizing). Eid seems to have an aura much like Christmas! Presents! new clothes and food and money are given by everyone, to everyone. Muslims also take this time to give alms to the poor: the mosques have been full of poor people this week, receiving food and money. Following tradition, we 3 roommates gave Eid money to the guards and housekeepers in our apartment building - this was an interesting cultural thing for us! And happily we got 2 days off of school in honor of the holiday, a much needed break. Yesterday, the day before Eid, we drove all around downtown Dhaka and saw things we hadn't had a chance to explore yet. Thank goodness that many, many people go home to villages to celebrate Eid and so the traffic wasn't its usual standstill - we got to see a lot. Including the biggest shopping mall in South Asia: Bashundara City. It was busy like Christmas Eve shopping is busy...
Here are some Eid Mubarak or 'Blessed Eid' pictures :)
thank you, guys, for all the support you give me. next time i'm going to try to do a series of photos of more difficult things that we saw yesterday on our day out, but here are happy things: