More than 20,000 people gathered in Birmingham to celebrate `Eid Al-Fitr while 2,000 people gathered to pray on Blackburn Rovers pitch, making it the first football club in the UK to host `Eid prayers.
“It’s always an experience really. We have five daily prayers in the day, but it’s very different on Eid because first of all there’s such a big crowd and there’s such a beautiful buzz,” Mustafa Hussein, an Imam at Green Lane Masjid and Community Centre who led the prayers, told BBC.
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“And it’s really a prayer of gratitude for having this blessed month that we had, fasting, coming together and especially after the last two years.”
Gathering after two years of restrictions, families expressed feelings of joy and happiness as they celebrated Eid together.
One worshipper told the BBC: “It’s been really, really nice seeing the whole community come out and just seeing everyone come together. It has really been amazing.”
Special `Eid
In Blackburn Rovers club, Muslim families gathered at Ewood Park to mark Eid.
Yasir Sufi, integration manager at the club, said: “We live and breathe, one town, one club, one community,” BBC reported.
“An event like this shows this better than anything else. It shows that we are all one, no matter who you are or what your identity is, the football club is somewhere where you belong.”
The three-day `Eid Al-Fitr festival is one of the two main religious celebrations in Islam, together with `Eid Al-Adha.
After special prayers to mark the day, festivities and merriment start with visits to the homes of friends and relatives.
And while traditionally everyone wears new clothes for `Eid, children look forward to gifts and traditional `ediya (cash).
During `Eid days, families and friends exchange visits to express well wishes and children, wearing new clothes bought especially for `Eid, enjoy going out in parks and open fields.