Muharram so far....

New York was great. It was great meeting two sisters that i have been talking to online and over the phone for quite a while. That was a meeting a long time coming and glad it finally came. The Khoei Center rocked. I can't believe how big it is and the school and everything. There were so many people there too. The lecture was okay. The English one was pretty elementary...the whole retelling of Karbala which i've heard so many times but it was still good. The smell of haleem filled the streets for blocks.

The Ashura procession was interesting. They had it early for city code reasons. The whole street was filled with people in the middle of Manhattan. A bunch of guys were doing matam. Very hard too. I hadn't seen men doing it before except maybe on tv before i converted....long before i understood it. I haven't done as much as i did last Muharram as far as study and lectures but at least i have a good excuse. There is just so much going on right now for us here. The procession was good and the food (of course). I thought I didn't want any but then i ate most of my husbands plate. Oops. The lectures were excellent. I had heard of Masooma Hydairy and I finally got to hear one of her lectures. Over all it was a most excellent weekend. Traffic was not fun though. Trying to leave NY for NJ took about fifteen minutes per block...it could have had something to do with the Chinese New Year as Chinatown was filled with celebratory papery. Haven't made it to the mosque here yet but we do plan on going. I will post some pictures that other people took soon (there were some 5,000 shias participating).