Egyptian Birthday Superstitions

by Michelle
(Charlotte, NC, USA)

My father and maternal grandfather are both from Egypt, and their traditions and customs influence every part of our lives. They greatly influence our birthday celebrations, mostly through their superstitions.

The Middle East is very rich in superstitions, and my family follows many of them. Firstly, we cannot celebrate our birthdays before our actual date of birth comes around. If our birthday falls on a weekday, we must wait until the next weekend to celebrate it, and are not allowed to celebrate it the weekend before.

This is because celebrating the weekend before your actual birth date would suggest that you are not going to be around to celebrate on the actual day of your birth.

Another tradition is to put an extra candle on the cake, which is a candle for the next year. The candle wishes the birthday girl or boy a healthy year so that they will live to see another birthday. The candle is a symbol of the birthday that will be celebrated the following year.

Last, but not least, is the pulling of the ears. After the person who is celebrating the birthday blows out their candles, another person, who is usually the father, has to stand behind the child and pull their ears a number of times equal to their age. So, if one is turning 21, their ears will be pulled 21 times. All of these traditions have been passed from generation to generation and make all of our birthday celebrations rich and meaningful.