A tough Ramadan

If I thought last year's Ramadan was challenging, I've changed my mind now.  This year, Ramadan fell smack into the middle of summer.  This is the period when daylight hours are at their longest, which means more hours of fasting.  For the first week of fasting, we could only break our fast no earlier than 9.45pm.  We had to make sure we don't eat too much so that we could sleep.  We would try to fall asleep no later than midnight before waking up again at 2am to have our morning meal.

Other than the long hours, the weather has been quite harsh.  Temperatures are mostly high, above 24C and the sun shines brightly every day. Also, the air is very dry with humidity at nothing higher than 50% some days. I think, for the whole of July, there were only two days of light rain and a couple of cloudy, windy days.

So, as you can imagine, it has been tough to fast under these conditions.  But we soldier on.  We try not to think about the thirst and the hunger.  We try to keep cool - splashing water on our faces, having the fan on the whole day, even dipping our feet in cold water while we sit by the tub.  Luckily I am on my school vacation.  I could stay home when it's too hot outside.  

Having said that, we do go out almost every day on our daily walks.  We try to go as early as possible to avoid the hot afternoon sun.  Or we could go out during the evenings.  The sun would still be out, but the temperature would have dropped to make it a comfortable walk.

Now, it's only ten more days of fasting left.  The task seemed insurmountable when the weather got hotter and hotter, but we hung on and tried our best.  A few more days of fasting, and then we could celebrate our steely resolution and determination.  Celebrate I definitely would, because of all my more than 30 years of Ramadan, this is by far the toughest.