How hard is it to decide when to celebrate Eid? Easy! Look at your work roster and choose. At least that is what most Pakistanis in Australia like to suggest. While a huge number of Pakistanis in Australia celebrated Eid on Wednesday, there was an equally large number that celebrated on Tuesday; and this happens every year.
Abdul Mateen, an international student in Perth, was home all day on Wednesday, though he celebrated Eid the day before. He says Tuesday was more "convenient".
"To be honest, though I was at work, it was convenient for me to offer the Eid prayer on Tuesday morning. My friend works with me so I asked him to stand at my station for some time, while I rushed to offer my prayers and came back."
"I have a bit of an understanding of the lunar months and moon sighting as well, and I am 100 per cent certain that Wednesday was the right day to celebrate Eid."
On Wednesday morning, Abdul Mateen's housemate, also his colleague, took the shift changeover from him as Abdul Mateen headed off home for a good all day's sleep.
"I follow both bents - those that follow lunar sighting and those who calculate it otherwise. This makes it easier to choose the day that suits me."
For Wollongong-based Dr Ayesha Basit, the more "feasible' day becomes the Eid day. This year, she says with a laugh, "Wednesday was feasible".
"I was working all day yesterday. Another reason is that all my family back in Pakistan celebrated today."
Haider Abbas, an international student in Melbourne, celebrated Eid on Wednesday. He follows the Shia Ulema Council Victoria, which announced Eid on Wednesday.
"I have a bit of an understanding of the lunar months and moon sighting as well, and I am 100 per cent certain that today was the right day to celebrate Eid," he says.
For Sydney-based Syed Hussain Gardezi, the popular vote among his circle of friends matters the most.
With a chucklesome tone, Hussain says, "I am part of a Whatsapp group and the moderator said Wednesday is Eid, so all the members celebrated on Wednesday, and so did my close friends."
In his two years in Australia, Hussain says, he has noticed that there are other sub-communities within the Pakistani community at large. Each of them, he says, has a concentrated area and they decide the Eid day according to what suits most of them.
"It is not about the moon sighting [fight] here. It is about these sub-communities and their choices. This is my personal observation."
Childhood memories
Ayesha says as a child all her Eid days were spent at her village home. She hardly gets time to go back there now and misses those days. She particularly misses playing with the animals along with her cousins and other children.
For Abdul Mateen, too, Eid day takes him back to his childhood days. With no immediate or extended family members in Australia, the signs of nostalgia were clear from his voice as he shared the details of his chat with his family earlier on Wednesday morning.
"My dad shared some photos of the cattle that my family in Pakistan slaughtered for Eid today. It took me back to a specific year when my younger brother refused to let my father take the animal away on Eid day. He was around four or five back then. It took me and dad a few hours to calm him down and convince him to let it go."
"It is not about the moon sighting [fight] here. It is about these sub-communities and their choices. This is my personal observation."
Abdul Mateen's brother, however, kept the rope used to tie the animal as memorabilia.
"Times have changed," he says, adding, "Now, we calm down our restless, nostalgic hearts by looking at the photos only."
The photo that made Abdul Mateen very nostalgic. Source: Abdul Mateen
Hussain recalls these times too, and how all the children in his family and community would spend all their time with the animals. The hardest, he says, was to wake up on Eid day only to find that the animals had gone "missing".
"The first day would be specifically disheartening," he remembers, but when asked if he enjoyed the food later, he chuckles and says, "well, on the second day, it would slowly start to get better."
