Ramadan! And how it's affected us.

A really bad picture of the Ramadan lights along the road.

Ok, before I came here, I knew next to nothing about Ramadan and although I am certainly no expert right now, I've gotten a lot more educated.  With the lights along the road (blue lights and crescents and arabic words) and the major, major holiday that it is, the best analogy is that it is kind of like Christmas.  There is a tradition of getting something new at the end of Ramadan so you get to buy yourself presents!  I think the execution of Ramadan can kind of be like the execution of Christmas in the West.  Christmas can turn into a giant over-indulgance fest instead of celebrating the birth of Jesus.  And Ramadan can turn into lots of feasting and entertaining all night and sleeping during the day to make the fasting easier.  Potentially both flawed vs. their original intents for some but clearly a big, big deal for many as they fast and focus on those less fortunate.  People are also encouraged to donate to the needy during Ramadan, too - a huge amount of money has been raised here for the Pakistan floods (our own Christian church has raised a good amount of money for the flood victims as well).  As even Jesus encouraged fasting in the Bible, Jake and I tried it one day, too.  Depriving ourselves is certainly powerfully spiritually and I can't imagine doing it every day from sun-up to sun-down for a whole month.

In any case, arriving in this new country right before Ramadan has been challenging.  Namely that most stores are closed all afternoon and open late in the mornings.  It seems that families switch their entire schedules around.  Sesame Street was having some special kids' programs nearby from 9 p.m. until midnight or 1 a.m.  I ran errands a few nights after the kids' bedtimes as without a sitter, that was one of the few times I could do it and there were kids, babies and families everywhere at 10 p.m.  So families stay up really late, wake up really early (breakfast at 4 a.m. or so before morning prayers) and then they sleep in and take a long afternoon nap.  Schools run on an abbreviated schedule - but would still be tough if you had a school-aged kid (our school is one of the only schools that has started yet - most schools don't start until the last week of Ramadan which is next week).

Also, all the restaurants are closed during the day.  So they are all mobbed after sundown (around 7pm). The breaking of the fast meal is called an "iftar" and the iftar meal is often served as a buffet in a tent.  So there are very large temporary tents set up all over the city.  The main mosque here reportedly feeds up to 15,000 people during its free iftar meal(s).  I'm not sure if they do one every night or if it was just a one-time thing.  Jake has a work iftar tonight at the Emirates Palace Hotel and he and I went to a small one at a cafe a few nights ago.  Food was tasty.

So for us, lots of cooking at home.  Eating at 7 or 7:30 is really too late for Anna or the other kids on a school night.  So I plan to hit some restaurants with the family when Ramadan ends as I'm weary of cooking all the time!

From what I understand, it's not only disrespectful but it's also illegal for adults to eat in public (but I haven't tested that...).  The kids still eat lunch in the school cafeteria but if adults are eating, they go behind a closed door and put a sign on it that says, "WARNING - FOOD BEING CONSUMED INSIDE."  It's definitely handled very differently here - as other fasting folks in most places all over the world just fast on their own and avoid food.  Here, it's pretty easy to avoid food as you'd never see it unless you were in your own home.

Only a few more days.