No One Prepared Me for What Happens on Eid in Egypt.

I was born in Watertown, New York — a small town about 30 minutes outside of Evans Mills. It was upstate and very small. The town had one major street, Main Street, where all the shops and stores were. Everyone knew everyone, especially my dad.

As an immigrant, my dad was doing pretty well. He owned a restaurant and a car dealership there. He worked so much to keep the businesses running that we didn’t have much time together. The furthest we ever went from Watertown was an hour away — to Niagara Falls or Alexandria Bay, where we’d sometimes vacation.

One thing’s for sure: there were no mosques where we lived. We didn’t have many Muslim friends, and we sure as hell didn’t celebrate many of the Muslim holidays either. That all changed when I was eleven. That summer after 5th grade, my mother took my siblings and me to Egypt. She missed it so much that we ended up staying for another 12 months! She enrolled me in 6th grade, and before I knew it, I was fasting for the holy month of Ramadan. It was a beautiful month surrounded by family and feasts.

There are two major Eids in Islam: Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha. Eid al-Fitr, also known as Eid al-Saghir (“the small Eid”), marks the end of Ramadan and is celebrated with communal prayers, gift giving, and feasts shared with family and the poor.

Eid al-Adha, also called Eid al-Kabeer (“the big Eid”), comes about two months later during the time of Hajj. It commemorates the Prophet Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son in obedience to God and is known for its animal sacrifices, charity, and multi-day celebrations with family and friends.

A couple of months after Ramadan, my uncle took the family out to a farm. All different kinds of livestock roamed freely — cows, lambs, and sheep. I was so excited to be there! I got to pet the cows and play with the sheep. The adults were talking to the owner of the farm when my uncle shook the man’s hand and walked toward us. He had a big smile on his face and said, “Okay, yalla you guys, in the car, we’re done.”

My uncle was a jokester and loved to pull my leg. He’d tell me things, and I was so naïve at the time that I’d believe him. He loved that apparently, because he did it a lot — telling me something only to later laugh and say he was joking. It started getting old after a while.

Once we were all in the car, he looked in the rearview mirror at me and my cousins, put his right thumb to his throat, and said, “Are you guys excited? We’re going to slaughter him!” We laughed at him and said, “No, we’re not!” He just laughed, and we drove home.

A couple of weeks later, I was in the bathroom washing up after breakfast when all of a sudden, I heard mooing! It was coming from the window facing the rotunda. Rotundas in Egypt were these open spaces in the middle of apartment buildings, often surrounded by the stairway. While going up and down the stairs, you had a view of the rotunda. You could look over the stairway ledge and down to the ground floor, or look up and see the sky.

Along the sides were windows to each apartment — usually to the kitchen or the bathroom.

“Moo!” I heard it again. I went to the kitchen and asked my mom, “Hey, did you hear that?”“Yes, those are the cows,” she replied.“The cows?! What do you mean?” I asked.“Go look,” she said nonchalantly.

I put my slippers on and walked outside the door. Down a flight of stairs, I peeked over the ledge into the rotunda, and lo and behold, I saw a big black cow and a brown lamb tied up downstairs on the ground floor. “Oh my God!”

I ran back inside and asked my mom, “Why is there a cow here?”“Because we are going to slaughter it later,” she said as she stirred her tea.“What?!” I gasped.“You’ll see,” she said.

I needed more witnesses to this phenomenon, so I grabbed my sister and brothers to see too — all with very surprised and incredulous reactions to the sight.

After a few hours of mooing and baaing, my mom came into our room and said, “It’s time. Get dressed and meet your uncle downstairs.” We obliged and huddled together in the elevator.

As we descended, I was filled with anticipation. “We’re going to see cows right here in our building!”

When the elevator opened, we were greeted by my uncle and cousins. There were other people there too — some who worked in the building and others who were just passing by. My jokester uncle came up to me and put his arm around my shoulder.“You ready?” he said.

I didn’t reply; I just looked around, studying all the people gathering.

Shortly after, my mother and aunt arrived, and my uncle began giving orders to a young man nearby. He then went to the doorway of the rotunda and brought out a big, beautiful, healthy-looking black cow. She was quiet and calm as she was being led, her hooves clacking on the ground. She passed us — her body large and magnificent. He stopped her in the middle of the entryway hall of our building, then took a few steps back. I looked around thinking, What’s going to happen next?

Then an older gentleman wearing a long brown jacket stepped forward from the crowd. He had his right hand inside the left side of his jacket. He walked over to the right side of the cow, looked up, and said, “Bismillah al-Rahman al-Raheem,” meaning “In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.”

Then, with his left hand, he reached around for her chin and pulled it ever so gently backward. With a swift motion, he took out his right hand — revealing a sharp knife the size of someone’s hand — and pulled it across the cow’s neck. She let out a struggling moo, slipped to the ground, and fell as bright red blood splattered all over the porcelain floor. I gasped and turned my head away into my mother’s chest.

I heard the cow’s hooves rattling against the floor as the butcher continued reciting Quran, blessing and thanking God for the sacrifice. I felt sad to see her go like that. After some time, I mustered up the courage to look back. The pool of blood was much larger now, almost reaching our shoes, so I took a few steps back.

Once the blood had almost stopped flowing, the butcher shaved a small slit down her torso and began removing her fur. He made it look so easy — it came off quickly and smoothly until her body was pink, except for her head, which remained black.

A few young men began mopping up the blood, then brought out the lamb — much smaller and thinner. His view of the cow was blocked by the men. They gave no indication that death was coming. This time, a younger man stepped up, said, “Bismillah al-Rahman al-Raheem,” pulled the lamb’s head back, and slit its throat. The lamb fell to the ground as blood poured out.

My mom pulled me close and said, “Take your palms to the blood and put them on our doorway.”“What?” I said.“Do it — it’s for good luck and protection.”

I hesitated and looked around before slowly kneeling down and dipping my hands in the warm blood. My brother did the same. I flipped my hands over and saw the bright red blood all over my fingers and palms.“C’mon,” I said to Ameer, my brother, and we made our way up the stairs toward our apartment.

Once we reached the 5th floor, we caught our breath. Ameer looked over and asked, “What do we do now?”I scanned the wall and decided on the left side of the door, at a diagonal. I slowly brought my bloodied hands to the doorway, making sure to get the placement right, and pressed down. Ameer did the same thing on the right side.

We looked up at each other and smiled before heading back down the stairs. My brother ran over to my mom.“We did it!”“Good job. Go wash your hands over there,” she said, pointing to the hose being used to clean the floors.

We did as she said. Then I noticed there were now big buckets surrounding the cow’s body as the butcher cut her into pieces — shoulders, ribs, thighs. Once full, my mom and aunt took the buckets up to my uncle’s apartment, where they began cutting the meat into smaller pieces and dividing them into plastic bags.

This went on for a few hours until, finally, the lamb and cow that had been baaing and mooing in the rotunda were now in a million pieces inside plastic bags.

My uncle filled larger bags with ten smaller bags of meat and instructed us to help him take them to the car. We grabbed a few, loaded them into the elevator, and headed down. He opened the trunk, placed them inside, and told us to get in the back.

For the rest of the night, my uncle drove to the poorest parts of the city — places where families slept outside in the cold winter. He’d stop, step out, call to the families, and hand them bags of fresh meat. Smiles, blessings, and gratitude swept over their faces. They were so happy to have that bag of meat to take home — it meant a warm meal for Eid.

We returned home that night with a good feeling in our hearts. Bringing food and hope to others was a beautiful way to end the night. Ascending back to our apartment, I thought, It was all worth it — people were happy and would eat for days.

As I stepped off the elevator to our apartment, I saw my handprints on the doorway. I said a little prayer and thanked the cow, the lamb, and God for a day well spent.