It's always the most beautiful period in the whole year, people wait for it so that all families come together, buy each other presents, and share warm wishes and feelings.
When I was a kid as I spent my childhood in Eastern Europe - Yugoslavia specifically, I used to enjoy those New Year's celebrations a lot, they’re actually the best memories I can find in my mind of such a lovely place. The Christmas trees that I always adored and enjoyed to decorate for a whole week before the event, Santa Claus's gifts that I used to desperately wait for – I even used to speak with him as I was asleep telling him about the gifts I really wanted, and even the charming winter and the white snow that I could see from my little window.
And even now after I'm back to Egypt I didn't stop celebrating the Western New Year, decorating the Christmas trees and going out in the New Year's Eve with friends to parties till the first hours of the morning.
A few years later I got back to my home town Cairo, and I found a different kind of New Year celebrations, it had a new shape and a new taste but it was really fascinating. And I guess that's the charming magic about cultural diversity: each culture has its beauty and charm that's why we should look at it, watch it, and observe it, we'd surely learn a lot from this.
In Egypt, like other Arab and Islamic countries we celebrate the New Year as the birthday of the prophet "Muhammad", as he was born the 12th of Rabie 1st (according to Arabic months) more than 1464 years ago.
You can find those charming Arabian decorations and multicolored joyful lights in the streets all over Cairo (my home town) and that beautiful Arabic song called "The Full moon has shined on us".
That song was first sang by the citizens of AlMadina when Prophet Muhammad and his followers emigrated to AlMadina from Mecca and it's one of the most famous traditional Muslim songs, you can find it in all the movies about the Prophet's life and the story of the emigration to AlMadina.
Parents in that day buy those famous sweets for this occasion for their children: the beautiful doll designed specifically for the Prophet's birthday celebrations with her beautiful multicolored dress, and the little boy on his horse. This day, children are desperately waiting for those sweets, the doll and the boy with some other sweets known for this occasion.
I remember I used to enjoy a lot drawing those two characters in drawing class at school. During this period actually we were all at school competing to draw the best picture of those two characters , and my mother framed the pictures I've drawn and till now
I have it framed in my room. Even the sweets stores are always competing to create the best designs for those two characters and innovate in their clothes and quality. Some of the Muslims here fast in this day as a way of expressing their respect to that holy day but it's not an obligatory thing.
I even found it more interesting in popular areas such as Alhussein and AlAzhar areas in the middle of Cairo, those ancient and historic places of the Islamic Cairo. As they are used to celebrate this holy day in a big festival we call it in Arabic Mouled. The word Mouled means in Arabic “Birth” but we use it sometimes for the festivals , and there are those Arabic drums and music, dancers and singers coming from every single part of Egypt (they have actually been waiting for the whole year to come and perform in that huge festival) and people selling food and sweets, and clowns and some people from the circus with their animals entertain in the middle of a huge crowd. They all do their best to impress the crowd, and get the attention of all the people for the longest time.
People bring their children and families to watch that big festival, buy sweets and play, dance and even sing with the entire crowd.
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