Feature: Egyptian Muslims celebrate Feast of Sacrifice

With joyful spirits, millions of Egyptian Muslims gathered in large open spaces and mosques to mark the beginning of the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha, which commemorates the end of the annual hajj pilgrimage.

In the capital Cairo, families flocked to mosques and squares to perform the festival prayers which started at 6:00 am local time.

"This is the greatest feast for Muslims," said Zaina Ahmed, a mother who joined her three teenage daughters for feast prayers at Cairo's Mustafa Mahmoud Mosque. The lady told Xinhua that her family has been waiting eagerly for the festivity.

Traditionally, buying new cloths for kids and sweets to serve visiting relatives are regular habits to mark the four-day occasion.

"We have well prepared for the feast. We bought new clothes for everyone in the family and we will spend good times together at public parks, cinemas and on the banks of the river Nile," she said as she prepared herself to start the fun day right after the early morning prayers.

Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice, is celebrated by Muslims worldwide in memory of Prophet Abraham's near-sacrifice of his own son as ordered by God.

It comes at the end of the pilgrimage rituals in Saudi Arabia as Muslims slaughter sheep, goats, camels or calves as a means of getting closer to Allah (God).

Despite financial difficulties and security instability, public parks, outdoor spaces, zoos and Nile cruises were filled with millions of visitors marking the festival.

In an effort to help people of all social classes enjoy the festivity, the government ordered that the country's 30 national parks would be open to the public at half-price tickets.

Next to Zaina and her daughters, Sayed Sheeba, a 35-year-old government employee said the feast celebrations in Egypt are extremely unique.

"Every year, my family and I go to pray in the morning and after that we go to a national park where we enjoy our breakfast meal," the man said as crowds started to leave the mosque after the prayers.

Despite the happy atmosphere surrounding Sheeaba, the man revealed that there is a slight feeling of unhappiness because he was financially unable to buy a sacrificial animal.

"I wished I could have bought an animal to sacrifice, but I cannot afford buying one," he said with a sad tone.

Egypt's economy has been struggling in the past five years due to political instability resulting from two uprisings that toppled two heads of state.

The North African country has been suffering from dwindling foreign currency reserves, which have decreased from 36 billion U.S. dollars in early 2011 to 17.5 billion dollars at the end of May 2016, in addition to an unprecedented devaluation of its own currency.

These frustrating economic conditions as well as high poverty rates led livestock traders to make unprecedented offers in order to their animals.

Egyptian Muslims can now buy a sacrificial animal throughout a sharing system through which five to eight persons can share a cow, calf or a camel.

Experts attribute the price hike of livestock to the U.S. dollar hike against the Egyptian pound which has recently exceeded 13 pounds in the black market, while the official value of the pound stands at 8.78 to the dollar.

"This helped me follow this important Islamic ritual," Mahmoud Kram from Maadi district in Cairo told Xinhua.

The 42-year-old accountant said he has tried to buy a sacrificial animal over the past three years, but the mounting prices of livestock have always made him hold back his plans.

"This year I shared a cow with six of my colleagues and my share was much less than the price of a sheep or a goat," he further explained as he watched a butcher skinning their white and black cow. Endit