Our fourth Ramadan starts in about 10 days. I say “about” because Muslims follow the lunar calendar and they actually wait until the moon-spotter (I don’t know what his official name is) sees the small crescent moon and then they declare it (with canon fire, though Twitter or text messages is how we check to see if it has begun or ended because you can’t always hear the cannons). It’s a rather archaic way to go about it since technically we can calculate the moon cycles to know when Ramadan will be 20 years from now, but it adds to the mystery of things.
It also means that we may call Ramadan before Oman calls Ramadan (each country declares it for themselves). Supposedly a spotter in one country may not see the moon due to cloud cover, but in our experience the Omanis manage to make Ramadan fall in a way that offers the most favorable holiday weekend conditions. I think last year we called it on Friday night and they didn’t call it until Saturday night. As a result they didn’t have to start fasting until the work week began.
Technically, I don’t mind Ramadan — it’s not like I have to fast, but it can put a cramp in our normal routine. It is illegal to eat, drink and chew gum in public for everyone during the month of Ramadan. So though I’m not fasting, I can’t even take a sip of water while driving or shopping, even though it’s blazing outside. And there’s something about Ramadan that makes me extremely thirsty. The rest of the year I can go all day without thinking about drinking water, but during this month I’m like a man in the desert with a parched mouth.
The other “problem” is that all restaurants and coffee shops are closed until the sun sets every day so there’s nowhere to actually go during the day to escape the heat, unless you like shopping. And even then it’s not like you can stop for a bite to eat or a cup of coffee. We do tend to get a bit stir crazy after a few weeks. Many who are fasting work in the mornings, sleep in the afternoons, and then eat and drink at night as soon as the sun goes down.
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| Yes, an actual display on base. Ramadan approved! |
But my biggest irritation with Ramadan has nothing to do with Muslims at all. The base has created a policy that during the month of Ramadan, all base personnel and their dependents must dress in long sleeves and long pants (technically elbows and knees have to be covered when seated). Supposedly this is out of respect for their conservative culture, but tell that to my Muslim landlord who strolls around in shorts and tanktops. Really, it’s a policy that the base would like to enforce just for women, but they can’t, so men have to suffer along too. That includes while working out — it must be done in long pants and long sleeves (unless you are in your house or on base). Have I mentioned it’s 110 degrees out?
The knees thing doesn’t really bother me since I generally keep my knees covered anyway, but elbows? Come on. When we lived in Oman it was a policy to “dress conservatively as you do the rest of the time, being sensitive to their religious holiday,” but not a knees and elbows ban. All it really serves to do is make it super easy to pick out all of the Americans when you go to the mall. They are the only ones wearing long pants and long sleeves. Which seems ironic when we’re always told to keep a low profile for force protection, but whatever. I’ve got my “Ramadan sweater” so I can wear tank tops at home and then throw the sweater on over them when I go out. It’s not a real sweater, but a super thin, cropped cardigan that does the job of covering my shoulders and elbows. I tend to wear it all year since shoulders are forbidden (I say that tongue in cheek, though there is a base policy for shoulders to be covered) and once you’ve had them covered for a while, it feels naked to be showing them off.
We purposefully planned our vacation to Italy for the second half of Ramadan. We’ll be walking around Rome in our tank tops and eating pizza by the slice, feeling absolutely free!