A Feast To End The Fast

Today was Eid. The day that signifies the end of the fasting month of Ramadhaan.

It's been an amazing month of reflection and spirituality, and abstinence from the ordinary and sinful too.
Not that we shouldn't abstain outside of the fasting month, but Ramadhaan just makes us more conscious of this fact.
So I took some time out today to review the Eid festivities, and realised that it takes the average person just one single day to undo all the good that a month of fasting had achieved.

Here's a prime example:
We have a massive breakfast on Eid morning at my home, inviting friends and family to partake of all manner of food and savouries.
This usually starts at around 9am and continues until around 11:30am.
Then we have a breather during which time a change of garments is in order.
Lunch is served at 1:30pm and continues until 3:30pm. This venue changes almost every year, with the only constant being the gaurantee of plenty of good food.
Supper is the grandest of all grand culinary affairs. We head to Benoni to my Aunts place, and by 8pm we're all pretty much elbow deep in every variation of prawn one could possibly imagine! Prawn curry, grilled prawns, braai'd prawn, lemon-butter prawns, peri-peri prawns... You name the prawn, and somebody is bound to be wolfing it down.

It's now almost midnight and I've just arrived back home.
I am so full of prawns I feel like a stuffed prawn sausage.
I will most probably skip all meals tomorrow in order to speed up the recovery process, as is the norm most years for me.

I don't think this is the way the wise men who came before us intended for us to spend the day... but quite frankly I can't walk away from all that good food.
I'll certainly try harder next year, but right now there's some fresh strawberry's dipped in melted Lindt chocolate waiting for me.

nomnomnom....

I Had A Dream

The fasting month began this week.
For all the virtues of this auspicious month, the one characteristic you never read or hear about are the dreams.
Yes, the dreams.

Ramadhaan is an amazing month for the cleansing of the mind, body and soul. Somewhere in this cleansing process I suspect the brain expunges all that is stored in its dusty cobwebbed memory bank and converts them into the most insane dreams known to man!
For those unfamiliar with Ramadhaan, we begin our fast at sunrise and end the fast at sunset, every day for a month.Before we begin the days fast, we awake at pre-dawn for a meal, usually around 4:30am.
After a light meal its a bit of prayer, then back to bed until we awake to begin the day as normal.
It's this period between the second sleep after the meal, and the final awakening for the day that produces these amazing dreams.

I've spoken to numerous people who have been fasting during the month, and they all have the same experience in varying degrees of weirdness.

Last night for me was especially surreal.
It was like a horror movie in the format of "Ghosts Of Girlfriends Past" and a little bit of "Shrek".
Sound insane?
Well imagine living through this in a 3D dream, complete with monsters and mothers!
At one point I recall being in court for some odd reason, and the judge was Jerry Springer!
I don't even have to make any of this up, thats how awesomely insane these dreams are.
Jerry Springer was banging his gavel on what looked liked one of Dolly Parton's boobs.
That's the other thing about these dreams.
They tend to take on a very sexual content for some reason, or at the very least they have some sprinkling of sexuality. I think as Hansie Cronje would say, it's the devil involved. That's the only logical explanation I can come up with.

As freaky as it is, I must admit that I do look forward to tonights episode.
I have no idea what to expect, but the missus has been advised that if at some point she hears me screaming hysterically in my sleep, she dare not wake me up!
There's nothing worse than being awakened from a captivating dream before you find out how it ends.
It's like watching an awesome movie and the lights come on just as it's nearing the grand finale.
So no cool!

I'll keep you updated about tonights main event.
Watch this space.