Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 12, 1994 TAG: 9402120105
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By MIKE HALE Knight-Ridder Newspapers
DATELINE: SAN JOSE, CALIF. LENGTH: Long
"I remember the whole family came," says Siddiqi, the imam, or spiritual leader, of the Islamic Center in downtown San Jose. "One never forgets those days."
Noureen Syed is 12, a seventh-grader at Quimby Oak Intermediate School in San Jose, and a lot closer to the days of her first fast. She was 9, and she was thirsty.
"The first day you feel weak. You feel kind of odd," she says. Her eyes widen at the memory. "Your throat starts to burn. I really wanted to take water."
But she didn't, even when she found herself reaching for a glass. ("You think, `Oh no! I'm supposed to be fasting!"') And after three years of practice - of fasting only during weekends - she's ready to do her duty as a Muslim: to fast, during the daylight hours, for the entire 29 or 30 days of Ramadan.
"I'm kind of nervous," Noureen says, not sounding nervous at all. "At break time I usually drink water; I'm scared I'm going to mess up.
"But when the day comes, you're fine."
The day is coming soon. This weekend marks the beginning of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month, a time of special devotion and celebration for the world's 1.2 billion Muslims. Through fasting, prayer and good works, they renew a sense of connection with God; and in coming together each night to pray and break their fasts, they draw closer to each other.
It's an especially exciting time for young Muslims, who usually begin full-time Ramadan fasting around the age of 11 or 12. There are parties for first-time fasters, with gifts and houses full of proud families. Following the end of Ramadan comes the holiday of Eid-ul-Fitr, which begins with prayer and then becomes a full day of feasting and socializing - the Muslim child's equivalent of Christmas or Passover.
For a new generation of young American Muslims, Ramadan holds particular joys and challenges. In a society where religion and daily life often don't mix - and where snack foods and soft drinks are practically a religion in themselves - observing the rituals of Ramadan can be both more difficult, and more rewarding.
Muslim teens who fast say they don't encounter resistance, but do have to spend a lot of time explaining why they're not having lunch or taking a drink after gym class. "Some people don't get it," says Sadaf Khatri, 15 and in her first year at Notre Dame high in San Jose. "They ask me if I want to eat something. They ask, `Are you on a diet?' I have to explain to them that it's part of my religion.
"They say, `Oh my god, it must be so hard! I feel so sorry for you.' But it's not like I'm dying because of it. I do it because I want to do it. I like to do it."
Sometimes Sadaf gets "real sleepy," and physical education classes can be a strain. "If I feel up to it, I'll do it. If I say I'm not going to run track, they understand."
Noureen Syed's brother, Adil, a 16-year-old, has a teen-ager's stoicism about the physical difficulties of fasting. "The first day is the hardest. As you go along it gets easier; you feel nothing, almost." Watching TV and playing basketball help him take his mind off the hunger.
"People say, `Oh, that sucks. I would never do it,"' Adil says. "I say, `It's not that hard. When you think about God it's easy."'
Sometimes people say worse. Adil, who was born in India, has been told to "go back to Arab land."
Adil links static at school to misrepresentation of Muslims in American society - to stereotypes of Muslims as terrorists, and assumptions that all Muslims are Arab (only about 12 percent of Muslims worldwide are).
Noureen nods. Her complaint is closer to home. "No one has ever heard of Ramadan," she says. "But they've heard of Chinese New Year and Hanukkah. You have Christmas - why can't we have our day? We feel left out."
In predominantly Islamic countries, adjustments are made at school and in the workplace during Ramadan. "There, the whole country will be tuned to the requirements of fasting," says Hasan Rahim, 42, an active member of the South Bay Islamic Association and editor of its quarterly magazine, Iqra. "Restaurants are closed. Those who aren't fasting eat in a not-obvious manner. Hours stay the same (at work and school), but the pace slows."
Rahim, a software consultant who immigrated from Bangladesh 20 years ago, says awareness of Ramadan here has increased greatly over the last five years. Muslim workers and students no longer call in sick en masse on Eid-ul-Fitr; local schools and employers routinely excuse absences for Eid. But he thinks that's just a beginning.
"There's no dropping off of routine" during Ramadan, Rahim says. "If people know this person is fasting, give him more trying jobs after Ramadan." He argues that at school, major projects should be scheduled so as to avoid Ramadan.
Akbar Syed, Noureen and Adil's father and director of education at the San Jose mosque, feels that local schools have been about as cooperative as they can. "We have to be practical," he says. "That is why we (the South Bay Islamic Association) are trying to establish a full-time Muslim school in San Jose."
Of the "Five Pillars" of Islam, the mandatory acts of faith a Muslim must perform - which include daily prayers, an annual tithe and a one-time pilgrimage to Mecca - fasting is perhaps the most remarkable to non-Muslims, the one hardest to imagine doing.
The Koran commands that Muslims past the age of puberty abstain from food, drink, tobacco and sex, from before sunrise until sunset, on each day of Ramadan. Exceptions are granted for, among others, those who are ill, elderly or on a long journey, and for women who are menstruating or have recently given birth.
Fasting is one of the ways of achieving taqwa, a quality considered essential for the devout Muslim. Siddiqi, imam of the downtown San Jose mosque, defines it as "the feeling that `God is within me.'
by CNB