El Mouled - Day 37

At first, we didn't know the reason behind the recent, special roadside stalls. Although we worked in the Gulf for years, we'd never much come across the celebration of El Mouled. It is little celebrated there. The word stands for birthday and in this case it is in celebration of Prophet Mohammed's birthday.

Each time we head to town, we see more and more of the special tents popping up selling both sweets and traditional dolls for the kids.





The Islamic calendar is lunar therefore important dates fall across the spectrum of the entire year in around a thirty-three year cycle. This year El Mouled falls on December 24th. The holiday may seem as though it's pretty close to Christmas this year. Yet, most of the Egyptian Christians are Coptic. They follow orthodox dates and their Christmas will take place on January 7th.

What a fun time of year though!