Sunday, November 05, 2006

Ramadhan and Eid in Germany

This Ramadhan was like the last one. We had Iftaar (ending the fast) every evening in the mosque. It is a totally different culture we have not experienced in Pakistan. Most of the bachelors do Iftaar in the mosque. There are about 70-90 people there daily. We also arranged two Iftaars. On both occasions we had more than normal attendance, thanks to the impression of South Asian food we left on the people last year. On the first occasion, we served chicken korma and sawayyan. As a drink, we served doodh soda (carbonated sweet milk). It was the first time in the mosque that the people couldn't fit in the eating hall and about 20 of them were seated in the praying hall. The second time, we prepared biryani and zarda (sweet rice). This time too people liked the food but they went crazy over zarda. It was unbelievably tasty and peopl searched to eat it aftwards till early morning.

On Eid, we prayed in the mosque, which as usual was over-crowded. It was a rainy day so we couldn't expand to the open area of the mosque. Had the Eid been one day earlier, we would have prayed in a conference hall at the university reserved for us. This was usually the case before the mosque was started. After the prayer, we decided to have a party at a Bar-B-Que spot in the university. At first the coals were not burning. Then when they burnt (after an hour of effort), it started to drizzle. We found a big piece of foam from the construction site nearby and used it as a cover for the Grill. It took us a lot of time to cook, but all-in-all it was fun.