King Of The Mountain

During the summer, especially during Ramadan that is our July this year, the farm is a great place to relax and enjoy the denizens. Google, our Nubian/Alpine buck likes to regard his domain from the top of the wall. Mindy, the Dane, on the other hand, is either curious about what he's doing or trying to encourage him to get down. Google, quite clearly, is having none of it.

A Water Tree

Wood is expensive in Egypt so many things are made from wrought iron. This rack carries earthenware jars that keep water cool by evaporation through the clay. During Ramadan these jars would be upside down and empty until just before sundown.

Ramadan Decorations

In the days before the start of Ramadan, the villages begin decorating with bits of foil glued over a string or stars cut from paper and glued onto a string.  The beginning of festive nights.

Decisions, Decisions

Dressed in their holiday finery, children in Shubramant ponder the important question of what toys to buy with the money they've been given by their parents and grandparents for the Feast. For four days, everyone will relax, eat cookies, watch children play and enjoy themselves.

The Eye

Shooting down into a terracotta water pot I find myself reflected against the sky. These pots are placed by people alongside the roads so that someone passing by can have a drink of water. During Ramadan a little is left in the pot for emergencies, but the pot will be filled just before sunset.

Juxtaposition

On the left is the village veterinary pharmacy with stocks made of pipe to hold a donkey, horse, cow, or mule steady for treatment. It was closed in the heat of the Ramadan afternoon. Right next door is, somehow appropriately I suppose, a butcher shop. It is open for business with housewives coming in for pieces of meat for the preparation of iftar.

Konefa Preparation

Konefa looks like shredded wheat when you see a tray of it prepared. It is threads of batter that are buttered and baked around something sweet like nuts or cream for a dessert or baked around something savoury like a prawn for an appetizer. But these threads are probably headed for the sweet batch as Ramadan housewives buy them up by the kilo to bake at home. The threads are cooked on a flat griddle on the round oven at the right as the konefa-man swirls a pot of batter with tiny holes punched in the bottom over the griddle. He wasn't working when we came by.

Ramadan Afternoon

A little girl walks home with a halter and rope while men sit on the wall of the empty coffee shop to chat. The fruit juice seller has washed his floors and is waiting for the pre-iftar rush of clients. Hot, slow afternoon.

Coffee Shop Near The End of Ramadan

The month of fasting is over as is the feast, but this photo of a village coffee shop during Ramadan shows the men sitting and watching traffic, bargaining for some sugar cane for their children, and not having any coffee or water pipes. In the evening the coffee shop would have been crowded with patrons. By day, it's pretty quiet.

Ramadan Decorations

In the villages and the more crowded sections of Cairo and Giza streamers of shiny paper or cutout shapes are strung from house to house during Ramadan, reinforcing the resemblance to a long Christmas holiday. A friend recently told me that during Ramadan in Jordan being caught eating or drinking in public, even for a foreigner, can result in jail time. I guess they must not have much tourism during the month. Not so here where life is rather more easy-going.

Fender Bender

We are moving into the second half of Ramadan, and you might ask what the picture of a traffic accident has to do with a month of fasting. Well, during the first week of Ramadan when our tea-drinking and cigarette smoking population is suffering from some very nasty caffeine and nicotine withdrawal, you would likely see much more heat from the gentlemen discussing the damage. The first week of Ramadan one of my friends reported seeing four fist fights among cab drivers during a 45 minute drive. Now, however, bodies are used to waiting until sunset for caffeine and nicotine...and two weeks of late night visiting and entertaining while working during the day are taking their toll and most people are too weary to think of fighting. Unfortunately, weary drivers are also more likely to have accidents. Not a good month for driving overall.

Molokheya For Breakfast

A huge pile of molokheya plants lie on the right and the women are sitting in the shade plucking the leaves from the stems. The leaves might be dried for use during the winter or simply washed and chopped finely to be added to a chicken or rabbit broth for a rich green soup. Many foreigners find molokheya to be a bit weird and slimy. The plant, swamp mallow, is basically a weed to everyone but Egyptians. Like many other plants in the mallow family, molokheya is a medicinal herb useful for stomach ailments. I've heard stories that the Japanese were so taken with the medicinal properties of molokheya that they made a soft drink from it. I love the stuff.

Siesta Time

Ramadan has started in our still summer weather and fasting from both water and food while doing physical labour is difficult. The farmers are rising early to work soon after the last meal of the night and then napping in the heat of the day.

Another Roadside Attraction

I don't like to drive during Ramadan. Driving in Cairo is hard enough. Driving on roads with about 10 million hungry, thirsty, tired, nicotine and caffeine deprived motorists REALLY is not fun. I don't know if there are statistics about whether the accidents increase during Ramadan, but the general consensus of the motorists I know is that there is. This particular smashup involved two passenger cars and dump truck. Crunch. Luckily there seemed to be no real casualties. Hopefully traffic was so bad that no one was moving very fast.

Breaking the Fast

We are halfway through the month of Ramadan now and everyone is pretty much into the routine of not eating and drinking all day, and then breaking the fast at sunset, often with friends and family. My neighbour, who manages a landscape nursery, invited me to join him and his crew for iftar in the nursery garden. A long table covered with plates containing roast goat, duck and rabbit, rice, bread, green salad, yogurt salad, stuffed eggplant and zucchini, pickles,dates, and fruit stood in the center of the garden and as the sunset call to prayer sounded, we all sat down to have iftar together. The meal was simple, healthy and plentiful, and afterwards all the smokers gratefully sat with a cigarette or water pipe to enjoy the night sounds in the garden. Ramadan Kareem.

Konafa...The Old Fashioned Way

A big part of Ramadan is sweets and most families make them at home. One of the favourites is konafa, which looks a lot like shredded wheat, but not nearly so organised. It is created from a sort of fine noodle that is made the old-fashioned way on a huge griddle. The konafa man takes a pot with fine holes drilled in the bottom, fills it with batter and in a smooth circular motion lays out long lines of the konafa on the griddle. About the time he has covered the entire griddle, the konafa is cooked, so he then scoops it off and piles it to one side. Housewives come and buy the konafa by the kilo, take it home and mix it with a bit of melted butter, then pack it lightly into a tray. A layer of cream, nuts and fruit, or even cheese for a savoury, might be added and then another layer of buttered konafa. This is then baked until the threads are golden brown and a bit crispy. A sweet konafa will then have a sugar or honey syrup poured over it. One of the posh bakeries in Cairo make a konafa that is crispy but not sweet and then spread whipped cream and strawberries on it. Deadly.

Aerial Act

It's Ramadan and this year date season is right on time. Dates are the traditional food with which one breaks the fast, and it's perfect to have them literally dropping off the trees. But most dates are harvested by men who climb up the palms and cut the branches full of ripe dates and then lower them to the ground in the round baskets that are themselves woven from the leaves of the date palm.

Ramadan Kareem

Today is the first day of the month of fasting, Ramadan, when Muslims all over the world will be going without food, water, and most importantly, coffee, tea, or cigarettes from dawn to dusk. In Egypt, the mood is most like a month long Christmas celebration with families gathering for iftar, the meal that breaks the fast each day. On the first day of Ramadan, traditionally one has iftar with one's mother, causing any number of problems for married couples who must choose one mother in law for the first day and the other for the second. The Ramadan lantern, or fanous, is the symbol of the holiday and they are hung on gates, in windows, even in trees, sometimes rivaling the Christmas deorations abroad.