“HEY, stop sitting on the goat,” my mum shouted. “But mum, I never get to have a pony to ride. All I have got is this bakra.” I tried to justify my actions.

“Come on Sadaf, you are a big girl now. Stop acting like a small child.”

And I reluctantly got off from the goat. He was probably relieved that his ordeal was finally over as he quickly sat and refused to get up.

“Mum, I think he wants to be friends with our neighbour’s bakri. He starts his ‘bayyyyy’ whenever he hears the neighbour’s goat bleating. It is as though he is answering her calls.”

My mum did not say anything. She had a look of despair as she rolled her eyes to heavens and disappeared in kitchen. I could not understand her. Maybe I did not want to. I was just glad that daddy had bought the goat a week before Eid; and I could play with him as much as I liked. I started to paint and write Eid Mubarak on it. Suddenly, the goat started to run in our lawn as the chord tied to it got loose. I ran after him and tried to control him by holding the chord. But he was too strong and dragged me along. Hearing the noise being raised, dad came out and took control of the matter.

“Better be careful! Animals can be unpredictable, so take no chances,” he advised me.

“It was not my fault; but I will be very careful, I promise,” I replied in my most innocent tone.

“I am sure, you will,” Daddy said with a smile and left. I took pictures of my painted and decorated goat, and decided to upload my artwork on my social networking page. I was looking forward to at least a 100 ‘Likes’ on the goat’s pictures. But during the next day or two, I only got seven ‘Likes’ for the images! Desperate, I searched for images of decorated goats on the internet. I was happy to find some images that gave me great ideas that I could try on my goat. There was one I particularly liked in which the goat had a Mohican hairstyle, and wore earrings, nose rings and lots of gorgeous tattoo-like designs. There were other pictures in which goats were wearing things like caps, mufflers and sunglasses and one cute animal was spotting a trimmed, stylish goatee (short beard).

On chand raat I started to decorate my goat in different ways. I gave the goat all kinds of makeovers and took pictures. I was happy with the results as the images looked as good as any I had seen on the internet. I quickly ran off to my room and started uploading my masterpieces on my social networking profile. This time, I was sure, that my work would be appreciated by all my friends and friends of friends on the profile. Then I got busy with Eid preparations with my family and daddy also took us out for an ice-cream as a treat.

The next morning, Eid day, I woke up due to a lot of noise coming from outside. I could sense that something was wrong. I rushed out only to find that my fashionable goat was missing.

“Did you tie its chord securely?” my mum cast a quizzical look towards me.

I felt like I had been hit by a bolt of lightning. I had loosened up the goat’s chord to decorate him but had failed to tie him up again after I was done. Parents are good at face-reading and my mum could read mine at that moment.

“Now look at what you have done Sadaf! Your dad spent a lot of money to buy it and now he has been out of the house for hours looking for it. Our Eid looks ruined because of you. I have told you many times to be responsible and careful but you hardly listen to me.”

I now felt totally ashamed, no amount of ‘Like’ on the pictures of my goat could make me feel better. I was so sorry that my desire to showoff to my friends had led to so much trouble for my parents.

“I am sorry mum. I promise that I would act more responsibly and careful from now on.” I also prayed to God that my dad should find our sacrificial goat so that our Eid would not be ruined and daddy would not have to spend more money to buy a new goat.

Luckily for us, daddy did manage to find the goat (and I believe it was mainly because of my effort of decorating it in such a nice way that it stood out and couldn’t be mistaken for anyone else’s animal).

What I learnt that day and which I hope all of you know without going though a difficult learning process like me, is that we should enjoy Eid and life in general; but one must act responsibly and carefully while doing that.