Feast of the Sacrifice

A couple weeks ago we decided to get out on the town for the Eid celebrations.  We wanted to meet with people and watch how others in town celebrated.  This was the feast of the sacrifice and is celebrated because Abraham did not have to kill his son Ishmael on the altar but another sacrifice from God was provided.  So, throughout town there were many many goats being slaughtered and sold for this purpose.

We picked up Steve in town and had some of our favorite local food downtown.  Then we headed over to a public area where there was a big festival and games set up for the celebration.

 The fair was a new experience for us all.  This place reminded me of how the Old West may have been in some ways.  Safety concerns are not a priority.  There are no guard rails around rides.  When a ride begins hang on to your children because if someone mindless walks into the path of a moving swing it's "too bad for them!"  And many of the rides were jammed close to each other so you had to watch where you were going most of the time!

Ian loved this ride.  And as you may be able to tell from the photo many of the rides where manual power.  Someday ran around in circles keeping the thing going!

This was a swing.  They had many of them.  We payed a dollar or so for all of us to go.  Then two guys pushed us and we were flying!

 This was the ferris wheel and the ride that ended our time at the grounds.  It too was manual powered by four guys.  They stood and pushed that thing like crazy and got us going so fast.  Then, they would stop us and swing us back.  Two of them would grab the front and because of the momentum of the wheel they would be pulled up half way up the wheel in the air until their body weight overcame the momentum and we started back down backwards.  Honestly, they were like spiderman going up they were flying all over the place.   So fun.  But, it was a little too much for our friend Steve who got sick.  He couldn't handle the motion.  The kids and I were on a different chair than him.  But, we could all tell he was in rough shape.  Then all of a sudden he barfed.  Unfortunately, we were directly underneath at that moment and got hit by some of it! So, we thought it was about time to call it after that!