Holiday RoundUp
The Christmas trees are down, the New Year's hats are all put up, and all the lamb blood has been washed off the sidewalks. We've had 3 good holidays all in a row here: Christmas (which they didn't celebrate but I did), New Year's (we both did that one), and Sacrifice Holiday (that was theirs).
Sacrifice Holiday (that's a literal translation from their language) came first. It's a big holiday for them, everybody gets off of work and school and visits with family. It's actually a Muslim holiday where they buy a lamb or a cow or a camel and take it to certain places and get it sacrificed (cut up). Then they take the meat from the animal and distribute it to family, friends, and the poor. I asked a lot of people why they did this, but no one ever gave me a straight answer. No one said they did it to atone for their sins, though, like we would expect. They have no concept of atonement.
Here's some pictures I found from the internet that show it pretty realistically:
I got to spend Sacrifice Holiday with different friends, one of whom I hadn't seen in like a year. He went to another city to study but had come back for the holiday. I also got to apply 1 Cor. 8 and 10 and enjoy some idol meat. (Some friends of mine got some meat from one of the sacrifices and we cooked and ate it together.) It was alright, if a little fatty.
Christmas came right after Sacrifice Holiday, not that anybody around these parts cared. As most people went to work and school and whatever else, I spent Christmas this year with the B's, a team family here in the city with me. I spent Christmas Eve night and all Christmas Day over there hanging out with the 4 B. kids, playing with them and their presents. Christmas was good this year, and a lot of fun.
New Year's is a big holiday over here. They celebrate it like we do, they just do it longer. You know our tradition of putting up Christmas trees for Christmas? They do the same thing, except they do it for New Year's. I still don't understand how they took our tradition and then decided to apply it to a completely different holiday. Actually, most people here think Christmas and New Year's are the same holiday in the USA. They're surprised when I tell them we have 2 different holidays. Anyway, I spent New Year's with some team friends and a local friend. We spent the night playing music, telling each other riddles, playing with sparklers, and of course eating some good chips and dip.
I guess that it is good that you are NOT a vegetarian. :)
Posted by
Polarbear |
2:35 PM