THE CROWD: I decided to be a part of the crowd.

It was about 8:30 in the morning when the bus on which i had boarded to reach college,stopped at Jamal.I looked out of the window to see what had happened.All the vehicles had stopped.Nothing was moving except for a huge mass of people who were heading towards ‘Jame Masjid’(the biggest mosque in Kathmandu).I had almost forgotten that it was a public holiday.It was the last day of month of Ramadan,Eid ul-fitr.

I had to reach the college in about half an hour and all the vehicles had come to halt. I decided to walk.

I was scared. When we hear the word ‘Muslim’,the first thing that comes to our mind is ‘conservative’. When we imagine a muslim,we imagine a man with long beard dressed in ‘sulwar kamiz’,white ‘kufi topi’ and woman in ‘burka’ and ‘hijab’.It is actually very difficult for us to imagine a Muslim in the clothes we generally wear.Not just their clothes,the way we look at them is also directly influenced by the way they have been potrayed in international medias.I have encountered alot of cases inside the public vehicle where people look at a Muslim with the eyes full of suspicion.It was funny but I was feeling the same.The crowd was full of Muslims dressed in sulwar kameez and kufi topis.Everyone looked the same except me who was standing little far from the crowd thinking whether or not to be a part of it.I was brainstorming the ‘could be harms’ of being a Hindu in the crowd of muslims and at the same time my values were reminding me of the type of person I was.I wanted to believe that I was like anyone of them.

I decided to be a part of the crowd. I could hear the thud of my heartbeat as I started walking.I walked past the man who was selling ice-cream.I walked past two Muslim kids who were holding balloons in their hands just the way I did when I was small.I walked past the man who was buying a paper fan for his son and also past a man who was holding his son’s hand tight to make sure he would not get lost in the crowd.I walked past the vendor selling vermicelli and finally past the mosque.It was no less than a scene from Khaled Hosseini’s novel.It was an adrenaline rush moment,the moment I realised that I was like any of them.And all of them were like me.

Today is Eid ul-adha.When I looked out of the window,I saw the crowd of Muslims walking towards the mosque. Today I smiled.

EID MUBARAK!