Ramadan is coming up and I feel quite
reflective. Also, I’m helping a friend out with a Ramadan
presentation to UAE newbies and thought I’d try to give UAE newbies who may come
across this blog a bit of understanding of how to deal with coming to the UAE
in Ramadan for the first time. As always, I am aware its with a little bit of
my own bias, because I do fast and I like it....also this is my blog so I’m
allowed to say whatever I like :-)
There are a lot of preconceptions and
misconceptions about the “holy month” that I hear which is down to ignorance.
The most common is an incredulous: “I can’t believe you can’t have
sex for a whole month” I mean seriously, Islam was started off in red-blooded
Arabia, do you really believe that’s the case? Also, I’m not going to try to
correct you when you’re so daft.
Ramadan and fasting is about abstinence
but not just abstinence of food and drink from sunrise to sunset. It’s also
about abstinence from bad habits. When I was younger, my spiritual teachers
would say that it’s very easy to become angry, give in to your urges and tell
someone where to get off for being a moron.
It’s not so easy, however, to be calm
and treat that person kindly and that’s why you should take the harder route.
Think about it: who benefits from you losing your temper? Not the said “moron”
and certainly not yourself.
(This is advice I try increasingly to follow and I have to say thank you to UAE customer service people, you have done wonders for my patience, especially you, Du. Thank you from the bottom of my heart and thank you twitter for giving me a space to vent so I don’t have to head-butt anyone :-) Btw, the secretvent blog is very good if you want to have a loud but confidential rant, I regularly think of quite a few things to vent about during the week and then usually someone else puts it up, which is still satisfying!)
(This is advice I try increasingly to follow and I have to say thank you to UAE customer service people, you have done wonders for my patience, especially you, Du. Thank you from the bottom of my heart and thank you twitter for giving me a space to vent so I don’t have to head-butt anyone :-) Btw, the secretvent blog is very good if you want to have a loud but confidential rant, I regularly think of quite a few things to vent about during the week and then usually someone else puts it up, which is still satisfying!)
Some of the Don’ts
1. Eat,
smoke or drink (even water) in public – malls, service stations, office, your
car, even most gyms and beaches don’t allow this
2. Play offensively loud music at any time of the day – including in your car
3. Dress provocatively – this is a rule for the entire year but people are more sensitive to this kind of thing in Ramadan
4. Swear or be aggressive – and especially not at anyone. Ramadan is a time for reflection and meditation and this could be seen as a sign of direct disrespect to people who are trying to maintain this.
5. Complain
of the fact that the nights are dry, or regale people with your stories of
house parties where you got drunk last night. The fasting person wants to keep
in the pure and meditation zone and doesn’t really care (and if its me, then I
don’t care even if I’m not fasting.)
NB: While following these rules
may be good to help one understand and be sensitive of the culture here, please
note a lot of the above is the law, and anyone caught breaking
it could be find up to 2000 Dirhams or put in jail for a month.
Do Get Involved
1. Accept
invitations to iftar – what better way to understand the culture than
to first hand see the benefits of families getting together. The Sheikh
Muhammad Centre for Cultural Understanding has traditional Emiratiiftars with
a Q&A after it if you want a local flavour to the month http://www.cultures.ae/
2. Be understanding of the fact that people are not eating, smoking, having their regular doses of caffeine and have also stayed up a large part of the night in prayer. They are bound to have a withdrawal headache of some sort, be slightly dull and/or possibly irritable.
3. Give charity – why not?
4. Try fasting for a day – if only to get an understanding of what your fasting colleagues are experiencing
5. Use wisely the 2 hours extra of your working day that you are legally required to get off in the UAE. In my case and some other media people, we add up the hours and get days in lieu which we can add up and take as holiday – it works out to about 4 days extra for that month, which is amazing.
Fasting (from food,
swearing etc ) is an activity like yoga; it starts of extremely
difficult and the more you do it, you realise suddenly that you can accomplish
exercises that 6 months or sometimes even 6 days ago seemed like climbing a
mountain. Each time you make it harder for yourself, because it feels good to
conquer your own inadequacies and it feels good to know you can do anything and
YOU are the controller of your body and feelings.
The fasting person is encouraged not to
swear, become angry or aggressive. They are encouraged to be even more mindful
of people’s feelings, be kind, give charity every day- more than once if
possible, do all of their five prayers (which they should do anyway) and a
massive extra one in the evening.
The fasting person is supposed to
cultivate better manners and try to develop at least one good character trait
that they can nurture during Ramadan and then keep for the rest of their lives
and I don’t think there is a more beautiful way of living than trying to better
person
