the Sunday before the Eid my roomie and I went around town a bit to gather some footage to share with friends and family like you! here you see the delivery guys with a family's sheep. living in a big city, there weren't large sheep souqs (markets) all around like there would be in smaller towns. i am thinking that the family went out to the ranches or farms to pick out a sheep and had an agreement of when it would be delivered.
here you see the sharpening guys. it is if utmost importance to have a selection of sharp, sharp knives. the knife to slit the throat of the lamb must be ultra sharp cause you are to only take one stroke across the neck as mandated in Islam. so, these guys set up shop all around town in order to offer their sharpening services.
then the other popular necessity for this big holiday: the grills and charcoal! since the family now has an entire sheep to eat, they get creative in how to prepare it. suprisingly they love making the meat into brochettes (skewers) on the grill. it is amazing how much charcoal smoke we smelled and saw after the day of the Big Eid! imagine every house on/in your block/apartment building grill sheep!
so, then we came back to our apartment building to find a couple of guys delivering another sheep for yet another family in our building. we started to smell the hay, their food, the sheep themselves, and of course their bi-products. it felt like we were back at the County Fair 4-H barn:)
then, the big day came: i was invited to join my friend, La, along with her family for the Eid. above is a photo taken from the roof looking down on the sheep for the families in their building. two were for La's family: one for her immediate family and the other for her uncle's family. 
above is my friend's family's sheep. i wasn't allowed to photograph the actual slaughtering, which i was okay with. but it was interesting. the other sheep was in the yard and they covered it with a tablecloth to keep the other sheep from seeing the other sheep getting the knife. this was done out of respect is what i was told.
then, after the sheep was slaughtering the skinning, the gutting, and cleaning happened like clockwork. everyone had a job and knew exactly what to do to quickly prepare the insides first as the meat would be prepared later as it is mandatory to leave the meat until all the blood drips from the corpse. above is the table of labor: preparing the brochettes of organs. my friend is cutting up rolls of fat (which was laid out to dry) that will be wrapped around pieces of lung, liver, or heart. salt and cumin are spices of choice during this holiday.
another shot of the table. now, you can see the grill, too. they would put the organ on the grill whole to cook it through and then taken off to be cut up and then wrapped up with fat and then put back on the grill. mmm good.
seriously nothing is wasted. the legs/hooves and head are also cut off and then roasted over a fire to get rid of the hair. they must be cleaned and then are saved for the next Friday's couscous. i actually helped clean a head (which was pretty intense) and then later ate some sheep head couscous on that following Friday! Fear Factor here I come:)
this was later that night when we grilled up again some brochettes. what i thought was interesting was that they grilled inside the home! it was super smoky. the meat was pretty delicious overall. i stayed the night and then the next day we had even more sheep meat of course.
it was an interesting celebration and i was thankful for the course i took at my school that helped explain why and what was going on exactly.
i didn't actually go inside (again, got to save some things for the next trip, right?) as i wasn't sure how much time i would have and spent all my euro cash on the bus fare. but i did walk all the way around peeking in on different openings to get glimpses of the inside. i was so happy that it wasn't raining yet. it was a nice morning for sure! i couldn't believe i was actually there!
then it was back on the bus where i saw many sites of course, but the next big one was the Circus Maximus that now operates as a park for the city.
then onto Campidoglio-Capitolino, the big steps. i tell you what, the bus offered some great shots on the fly!
then later, onto San Pietro square! again, it was different than i had expected, but pretty incredible to say the least. behind me is where the Pope gives weekly addresses as well as others. it was lightly raining at this point.
it is just so huge! look at the people there at the entrance. i didn't wait in the really long line to go in here either (again, gotta save some stuff for next time:) but you can also see all the chairs they have out for people to come and listen.
i really liked this photo above. i feel like it captures it all. the basilica, the piazza, this man of God, the huge screen to broadcast the Pope, the fountain, the statues of saints up top, etc.
then i followed lunch up with a healthy serving of gelato! right when i left the gelato shop it started to downpour! so, i rushed over to the closest bus stop to wait and try to juggle my gelato, umbrella, and bus ticket. thankfully there was an empty seat on the bus, so i could sit and enjoy my gelato while watching from the comfort of my seat. 
inside the dome actually had this opening. the building was huge! at this point it was raining pretty good and the opening allowed rain into this place of worship. they had the wet area roped off, so it was just raining down on folks. i thought that was interesting. 
then we moved onto the pyramids and sphinx! it was absolutely incredible. quite surreal, too. i was so happy cause it was nice, warm, and sunny! below i am in front of the Great Pyramid, the largest of the three. it was suprising how close the site was to the city, but you have to remember that the Nile actually ran right up next to the pyramids at one point in time.
this guy was such a cutie. thankfully he (maybe she) belonged to one of the security officers, so we didn't get hassled about taking a photo with him (or get asked to pay). he (or she) decided to cheese it up with me for the photo--what a great photo opp! :)
here, i am actually up next to ruins from one of the widow's pyramid. they were much smaller in comparison to the other larger ones, but they had the same blocks (meaning huge, rock blocks) that were used for the three larger pyramids. i don't think you can really climb all over the big 3, so i climbed up here to give you some perspective on just how large these blocks are and how intense building these great structures must have been! amazing!
on the way to the middle pyramid, i opted to take a camel ride. for some reason the guy (photographed here to the left) decided that he wanted to ride with me, but that is kind of not very respectable in this culture and for some reason seemed to want to take advantage of the situation to ride with me. my fabulous friend insisted that this was not appropriate and i actually only rode for a few steps, got my photo opp and we walked the rest of the way. oh well. no big deal. at least i got the infamous shot! :)
we walked up to the rear of the site so i could take some photos from behind. i was just so excited to be there and in awe of it all. jumping for joy here:
mio and my fabulous tour guide/hostess with the mostess. she grew up in AR, too. we had a great time talking with each other about our experiences in northern Africa and encouraging one another. it was really refreshing to have this time with her as we could relate on some things and even talk about AR and understand what each other was talking about (she was like a piece of home:). it was truly a blssing to be with her indeed. thanks, thanks, thanks T!
so, then more food fun! they had this insanely huge mall that had all kinds of restaurants, including On the Border. we just don't have any mexican restaurants here for some reason, so that was a major priority for me: fish tacos, chips and salsa, and queso!
oh, then it was the next morning stop at this bagel place! this is the cinnamon crunch bagel with strawberry philly cream cheese! i went back for another--we just don't have these here either. it was so, so good!
then, i went down town to the big museum. it was incredible. i couldn't take any photos inside, but here is the entrance with a statue. there were so many tombs, mummy cases, etc. there! it was incredible and i was really excited that the King Tut exhibit was present and didn't cost extra:) wow, really.
then we went to the market (like our medina) to do some shopping and there were a couple of some of the oldest mosques in the city there. it was interesting to see the different architecture of their mosques than of ours here. 
it was an incredible trip that provides me so many memories. i still can't believe i got to go really. very, very thankful indeed!
i also had the privilege to make up a cheeseball! it was a tweaked recipe from what is available here. and got to make up some mashed potatoes to share. let's just say it was an all out Thanksgiving bash!
below is a photo of my plate--yummy teamwork, aye?
i hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving holiday celebrating with your family and friends. there is just so much to be thankful for isn't there?
it was happy birthday to my roommate! it was great to have her folks there, too. we had quite the crew there, so it was a special celebration for a special lady indeed. below was the spread after the meal at TGIFriday's. yummy cake and ice cream. the candles are arranged into the number 25 since it was her 25th birthday! beautiful!
so, this week has been exciting to say the least. i am back in class taking a class that covers the upcoming Big Eid. looking forward to Thanksgiving and thankful for so much that i am truly grateful for like my family, friends, this opportunity to be here, food, shelter, water, and most of all my G. i hope you have a really great Thanksgiving with you and yours.
hey mom! here's me with some of the ruins. we immediately started taking photos and were snapping shots just about every moment we were there. there was so much to look at and observe. i wondered about so many of the people and the places that existed there. what was it like? amazing really. kind of makes me think about the impression i or we will make on this place. hmmm.
i was most suprised by the number of still intact mosaics. i was thinking there would maybe be like a couple, but there were at least 10 that looked amazing. such incredible craftsmanship here! and these folks were very creative. many were of animals and people and their gods.
i love all the archways and you can see the triumphal arch in the distance to the left. it was quite impressive. much of this place was pillaged by invaders in order to take the resources (marble, stone, etc.) to build other buildings for their cause elsewhere--very interesting, huh? can you imagine what more would still be here today if that had not happened. i also think that this particular invader wanted to disassemble this place because of its idolatry and to claim their stake in this new to them place.
there were many baths there. some looked public while others were for more personal use. amazing how their tubs remained. obviously this was a big part of their culture/life. pretty cool. i liked this one especially cause it had the cut-outs for folks to maybe have their own space.