Kota Kinabalu: Muslims in the State Capital are looking forward to celebrate Hari Raya Aidilfitri with various preparations this year despite not being able to return to their hometowns as inter-district travel is not allowed.
A check found supermarkets and shopping centres here, such as in Jalan Segama, had started to become the focus of the people who took the opportunity to shop for Raya clothes for the big day next week.
Some textile outlets are also offering Raya clothes for as low as RM9.90 to attract the attention of customers and as an initiative to ease the burden of most city dwellers whose economy was also affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
An Inanam resident, Zuhaimi Ismail, 47, said the merriment of celebrating Aidilfitri was more widely felt compared to last year and he made moderate preparation by only spending on basic needs.
‘’I only make do for Hari Raya...only for the family since we cannot travel cross-district and cross-state this time. Expenditure for Raya clothes is more for my three sons,’’ he said when met at a textile shop, here, Thursday.
Another visitor Saadiah Rajis, 49, said she was excited and happy at being given the flexibility to celebrate Aidilfitri especially in the areas under the Conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO) and Recovery Movement Control Order (RMCO).
‘’The Hari Raya last year was very quiet and this year I could feel the festive air and spirit to enliven the house for Aidifitri again. I have made preparation much earlier and I see there are indeed many outlets and supermarkets offering reasonable prices depending on the quality, in fact some are much cheaper,’’ she said.
For Gina Majid, 38, from Sandakan, the public too were seen used to adapting to the new norm when shopping by complying with the standard operating procedure set such as wearing masks, scanning the MySejahtera application before entering an outlet and minding the physical distance.
Meanwhile, a textile shop shop assistant, Haryani Abdul Halim, 40, said her shop offered various selections of raya clothes with attractive price cuts.
“Visitors can get children’s ‘baju melayu’ for as low as RM9.90 and adult ‘baju melayu’ at RM19.90. We are also offering RM19.90 for children’s ‘baju kurung’ and RM29.90 for an adult’s ‘baju kurung’,’’ she said.
Sabah is placed under CMCO until May 17.
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