Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Religious festival of Eid al-Adha

Today is the start of the three day religious festival of Eid al-Adha (the Festival of Sacrifice). It marks the end of the Hajj, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia, which was attended by well over 3 million pilgrims this year, including two Capetonians who cycled all the way.
My photo today was taken this morning at the cemetery of the Constantia Mosque on Spaanschemat River Road. On the first day of Eid al-Adha, Muslims attend morning prayers at their local mosque before going on to join family and friends for celebrations.
This area of Constantia has an interesting history in that the original farm was apparently bought at an auction on the Parade in 1902 by the Solomons family who lived in the large Victorian house on the farm until the dark, shameful days of apartheid when they were evicted from their land in 1966 because it had been zoned for “whites” only under the infamous Group Areas Act and they happened to be classified as “coloured”. Their houses were demolished, but their cemetery and mosque were spared and continued to be used by the families who were scattered far and wide.
With the dawn of the new South Africa in the 1990s, the families lodged a land claim, and the process has now drawn to a conclusion with the restitution of what remains of their once extensive land to the families.
Eid Mubarak to all!
For more posts around the world today, go to ABC Wednesday.

7 comments:

  1. There is an increasing number of immigrants in our area, esp from Pakistan, which is the only reason I know about Eid.

    ROG, ABC Wednesday team

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  2. It's good to hear a happy ending. Thank you for sharing.
    Donna - ABC Wednesday

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  3. Thank you for a post with great photo and wordsw that educates us non-South Africans to more of the past in South Africa. Thank you on this feast of Eid al-Adha for the end of apartheid!

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  4. Thanks for sharing! I'm looking forward to learning more about Capetown.

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  5. The same happened here in South End with the mosques being spared but the house demolished. All these years the people have come back to worship at the mosques even though most of them now live on the other side of town.

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  6. beautiful information.
    cute take on r.

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