Ramadan and Kurban
Turhan Ece from Turkey
There are a lot of different types of celebrations in Turkey. Some of them are from our religion. These annual festivals are celebrated two times a year. They are organized by the Islamic calendar. According the the Christian era (A.D.), both of them are celebrated 11 days earlier than the previous year's annual religious festival.
One of them is the Ramadan festival which is celebrated after the fasting days for 30 days. Ramadan means to share emotions that the poor people feel and live because they can't earn enough money to buy food and to spend easily. At the same time, Ramadan means to support poor people with money because the religion of Islam orders us to give to poor people some money or gifts that are 1/40 of our wealth, like a tax. The money and /or gifts are given to poor people politely when they are visited by their relatives and other rich people.
The Ramadan festival continues three days. Elderly sick people are visited by their young relatives. All people prepare for the festival. They make a big cleansing in their homes and yards before the festival date, and they wear the cleanest or the newest clothes. All of the children are given some gifts by parents and relatives.
The other religious festival, the Kurban festival, is celebrated almost the same as they Ramadan festival. This time, most of the gifts are food.
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