Eid: a time of family get-together

LAHORE: Eid is a time of family get-togethers. What a lady of the house has to ensure on Eid is at least a good meal and some snacks befitting for the occasion. Laying a decent table suitable for the occasion is not easy anymore for a large number of people.

This time round Amina, a young teacher, and Anna, a beautician, came up with an idea to prepare one dish each and take it to the elder’s home where the family gathers on Eid every year. One of them informed the elder of the plan. The lady of the house felt happy at their thoughtfulness. She did not try to stop them from doing so. She will do her part, but certainly the girls by offering help, have taken the worries off the host’s mind. It is not just about expenses, it is also about sharing the elders’ workload.

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Eid is a time of bonding with family more than anything else. When the grandparents are no more, the elders are chacha and mamu whose homes become the meeting points for all the nephews and nieces with their spouses and children. Oh, what a blessing Eid is, that brings the family together. How I look forward to it.

How the expenses have shot up can be gauged from what a shopkeeper who runs a good bedsheets’ shop in Lahore shared. Earlier, women who would buy four bedsheets around Eid, have restrained themselves to buying only one, he said. He had the habit of taking fruits on his way back home in the evening, he said. “That is no more possible. I buy fruits on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays only when the family is all there. What would you buy? Bananas and apples are so pricey, we stick to the basics.

“The kitchen would be taken care of in 39k (Rs39,000) earlier, now that expense has shot up to 70k (Rs70,000).” How people dread the thought of electricity bill in summers goes beyond saying.

The lady of the house has to take care of many things. New bedsheets, kitchen and dining accessories, getting curtains drycleaned apart from providing new clothes and sandals to all the members at home are her very basic expenses. A shopkeeper said clothes and sandals are still selling but a utensils’ storekeeper complained of less buyers this year-round.

I noticed there wasn’t any rush at the laces’ stores or at the dupatta dyers, and a towels’ seller asked “don’t people need towels?” People need them but are curtailing their needs because they are cash-strapped.