A Meal Full of Blessings

“My heart was filled with happiness walking home knowing I am bringing rizq [blessings] to my family,” said Shabana.

Shabana is a 40-year-old single mother who struggles to provide for her six children and her mother in-law. Shabana makes roughly $11 per month working as a maid. She is sometimes allowed to take bread home as one of the perks, but on a typical night, she and her family go to sleep hungry, the smaller of her children often crying from the pain in their stomachs.

This Eid was beginning to look uneventful because Shabana couldn’t afford new clothes for her children, but she said it truly felt like Eid when she received fresh meat from Zakat Foundation of America’s Udhiya/Qurbani distribution. It reminded her family of when her husband used to get meat and they’d call their families to gather, she said.

The children could smell the aroma of meat cooking, and after eating, they felt a fullness they don’t get from their normal meals. Eid is the only time of year in which her family eats meat.

“I want to feed delicious foods to my family,” Shabana said. “We normally eat rice and vegetables, and sometimes leftover food from the neighbors. We like to eat meat, but I cannot afford it.”

Zakat Foundation volunteers visited her house and saw her situation. They gave her a pack from the distribution so that on this blessed Eid, she would be able to cook meat for her whole family. She would like to offer a special thank you to the Zakat Foundation donors who contributed. These 2 kilograms of Qurbani meat will feed her family of eight for a week without them having to go hungry, she said.

“I could not make my family smile, but you did,” Shabana said. She asks God that He may accept your Qurbani gift and reward you and your family immensely with good health and wealth.