Ramadan

Today is the first day of Ramadan. Since its dates are determined by the Islamic lunar calendar, it falls 12 days earlier each year, and thus it now begins in August rather than December as when I first arrived in Egypt.

Fasting in August is obviously more difficult than in December– the sun is up longer now, and the weather is less conducive to abstaining from liquids. As a general rule, the food part of the fast really isn’t that hard; it’s the water part that’s hard, resulting in headaches.

Life doesn’t quite function normally here during Ramadan, even though people work harder than you’d expect, given the ready-made excuse for not having full levels of energy.

For teaching purposes, classes are slightly shorter and either earlier or later than usual. The reason is that the University needs to carve out a big block of time in mid-afternoon for students to return home for Iftar (the fast-breaking meal at sundown).

For my first time since arriving in Cairo I have one class very late in the afternoon, and under the Ramadan schedule it becomes an 8-9 PM class, which I haven’t done since Chicago days.

But it’s only two and a half weeks of Ramadan teaching this year. By September 20 or so it’ll be over, and life will return to normal.