Not only is it Eid Al Fitr, according to my culturally sensitive wall calendar, it is also Day of The Race. But don't be looking for a bunch of Ukrainians and Nigerians with numbers on their chests running down your Main Street, USA . (That was a different race, last weekend in St. Paul.) Apparently this "race" has nothing to do with running. Instead it has something to do with ethnicity. Or, more precisely, the end result of what happened when the Spaniards met the indigenous in Latin America.
Although Spain imposed its government and religion, the people intermarried and many native traditions have survived. Our nation today is a mixture of the Spanish and the indigenous. We call that new race and that new culture --which came into existence partly because Christopher Columbus landed in America 507 years ago-- mestizo, and that is what we celebrate on October 12th, Día de la Raza.
Interesting. Although I think the term "THE race" is a tad exclusionary. What about everybody else? Don't we count? Maybe that explains why I don't get a three day weekend for this holiday either.
In any regard, congratulations on your ethnic identity, mi amigos!
Except in Venezuela. For you, way to resist indigenously.
Looking ahead on the old calendar on the wall, I see at the end of October, we get the darkest, most frightening and morbid of all holidays. Yes, United Nations Day (October 24). Where, by tradition, family and friends get together, exchange gifts, have a lavish feast, then write up a resolution condemning Israel.
From all of us at Fraters Libertas, we wish you an yours the happiest of United Nations Day seasons.
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