US `Eid Defies Recession

By Farah Akbar and Tanvir Raquib, IOL Correspondents

NEW YORK — Abdul Khalique somehow managed to keep the tradition of hosting festive luncheons and dinners for his family and friends during this year’s `Eid Al—Fitr.

The Muslim New Yorker admits, however, it was no easy thing to do amid a severe financial chill gripping many households, including his own.

"Before we used to go to people’s homes and always give them `Eid gifts, especially the young," he told IslamOnline.net.

Abdul Khalique asserts that many Muslim Americans have felt the pain of the global recession that seems to sting a little more on the three-day `eid, which marks the end of the holy fasting month.

"For the unemployed and retired, it’s very hard for them."

But Abdul Khalique managed to throw the `Eid party which his children eagerly await every year to mingle with their many cousins and friends to celebrate Ramadan’s end.

Many Muslim families also defied the financial meltdown to bring the spirit of `Eid to their homes.

In Jackson Heights, Queens Muslim shoppers jam-packed the shops of many supermarkets and clothing stores.

They loaded their shopping carts with an array of vegetables, exotic spices and delicious lentils in preparation for the mouth-watering meals to be served the next day for friends and family.

Though business owners could not deny that sales had dropped this year due to the recession, they did not appear shaken.

"It’s not what it was last year," said one shopkeeper busily while she attended to customers.

"But we were not expecting last year’s sales. Things are still pretty good."

The US fell into the grip of the worst economic crisis since 1930s in September after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the fourth-largest investment bank, and the financial woes of a number of Wall Street giants.

The fallout has developed into a full-fledged recession, threatening personal finances as home prices fall, retirement funds shrink and access to credit and jobs evaporate.

Charity

Despite the economic hard times, American Muslims were also keen not to let the recession woes derail their charitable giving.

During Ramadan and `Eid Al-Fitr, many are determined to donate or volunteer to help the less-fortunate, and one example to that is Kity Khundkar and Mian Akbar’s charity project for which they held a fundraiser and an iftar party in their New York home.

“We know that people are more giving during Ramadan,” says Khundkar, who sponsors along with her husband a non-profit hospital in Bangladesh that offers eye-sight restoration surgery to impoverished individuals.

"That is why we chose to hold the fundraiser during this time.”

Remarkably, the couple surpassed their fundraising goal for the hospital by over fifty percent.

And though mosques too felt the pinch of the recession, the bleak financial outlook could not stop charity works.

In Al-Amin Jame Masjid & Islamic Center in Long Island City, Queens, the collection of donations was only slightly lower compared to previous `eids.

As nearly 2,000 people attended `eid prayers in the mosque, many worshippers were determined to contribute for charity as in previous years.

One mosque official affirmed that imams have received significant financial aid from mosque-goers.

“The community is strong,” the mosque official said.

New York City is home to a fast-growing Muslim community of nearly 80,000.

There are between six to seven million Muslims living in the entire United States.