Ramadhan

It’s the 11^th day of Ramadhan, and I feel as if this blessed month is fading away fast. The first day of Ramadhan is determined by the sighting of the moon the night before. Originally, my family and I thought that the first day would be Saturday; this would have been great news for me as I could have had the whole weekend to get used to it, and then start work on Monday. However, on Thursday night, I received 2 texts from my friends confirming that Ramadhan would start on Friday.  Consequently this meant that I would have to start my evening prayers earlier than usual because I have to pray Tarawih(special prayers that Muslims pray during the 29/30 days of Ramadhan, in between the evening prayers). This can take some time – some people take 45 minutes and some take 1 hour to complete the evening prayers during Ramadhan, so it’s best advised to complete it early (the whole prayer should be complete before midnight)

This weekend I had quite a lot of family over, due to this I couldn’t catch up on my much needed sleep as I would have liked. I thought it would be a bit strange and awkward for people to visit other people’s houses during Ramadhan, considering everyone would be fasting, so we can’t offer them any refreshments, etc. They were unwilling to stay until Iftar(the meal used to break our fast) as we break it at sunset, which is close to 9pm nowadays, and my relatives left at like 6pm because they wanted to break their fasts, in their own homes, which was understandable.

On Sunday my cousins came. This was a pleasant surprise. As my cousin brother is due to get married on 26^th August, they bought all the wedding dresses for the bride earlier in the day and they bought them to my house to show me and my family. I thought that this was a very sweet gesture. All together, they bought one lehenga and 5 sarees. They now need to send it over to the bride so that she can buy all her accessories, jewellery and shoes to match each outfit. My cousins parents who currently live in Bangladesh are due to come over to the UK a week or so before the wedding and they plan on living here for 6 months. My cousin’s mum and my dad are siblings, so we are quite close to each other in terms of family relationships.

 Overall it’s a really exciting time in our family with lots to look forward to.