We’ve crossed a few milestones in our fasting month, which I have neglected to mention. First, we’ve completed the first ten days. Each ten day cycles is marked by another “grace” according to tradition. The first ten days are mercy, the second ten days are forgiveness and the third ten days are immunity form the fire. Now we have moved from mercy to forgiveness. Oh Allah, forgive me my shortcomings and strengthen me in the struggle to serve with love and compassion. Amin
The other milestone, at least for my part of the world, the full length of the fasting day now starts later than 5 a.m. and ends earlier 8 p.m. That’s a major psychological incentive. The sun is moving (or rather the earth’s relationship to the sun is moving) incrementally every day. When we started Ramadan, I had to” think” some time related to 4 a.m. and some time after 8 p.m. These few minutes of digital adjustment feels like an hour.
These little things help with the arduously long month of this particular regimen and ritual. This made me think about the secrets of a successful suhur (s.o.s. for short). I’m a suhur diehard. In addition, at my age and level of health, I cannot survive without suhur. In my younger days, if I missed it I would struggle through the day without it. It was noticeably more difficult, but I could make it. One missed day was about all I would allow in a month’s time. If it happened at all and I can say I rarely let it happen year after year, it acted as an incentive not to be negligent again!
I think it is safe to say that at least half of the Muslims fasting do not even attempt to start their fasting day with suhur. Let’s call them the “non-suhur people”; as opposed to those like me, whom I call the “suhur diehards”. Non-suhur people are NOT morning people. They may get up for work or class or an appointment but only for work or class or an appointment, and when these do not force them to get up, they sleep in. Even if they have one of those kind of five-days-a-week schedules that forces them up, it never becomes the norm; but is always an abnormal necessity. Therefore on the weekends, they stay in bed asleep for as long as they feel normal.
Non-suhur people do not eat in the morning anyway. Maybe coffee, but it seems like their body cannot respond to nutrients until they’ve gotten the ball rolling around the court for a few hours. The thought of a bowl of oatmeal at 4 a.m. is about the same as dental surgery without anesthesia. I know, I make it sound horrible, but it is important to get the gist of the aberration that the very idea of going to bed and forcing oneself to not only wake up; but then to eat—and this is supposed to be a blessing!
To be kind, non-suhur people are night people. They thrive on the second half of the day, and when they return from that abnormal work day they come alive (Not like me. I’m brain dead after 6pm). They are not active during the night, and that is when they are the most creative and productive. For them, what ever was the last meal that they took—and in Ramadan there will be a concerted effort to eat something before going to bed—then, technically, that is their suhur equivalent. Some will roll over for a glass of water, or even to take prescriptions, but that is all you can expect.
I learned about these more intimately when my children were teenagers and when they went off to college. They made their way through the fasting month successfully and never got up in the morning. These are my children and I love them, I found a place to accept this strange and awkward mode of operation. Because for me—a suhur diehard—there is no Ramadan without suhur. This brings me to a few secrets of a successful suhur, s.o.s. I mean, even in all my morning person glory, I don’t normally eat at 4 a.m.! Most of these secrets I learned in the 30 years I spent waking up those mostly night persons, my children, at various stages of their lives, including visits home from college when they would accept to be subjected to my obsessive diehard suhur regimen. These I will pass along to you, free of charge. A few others I learned while traveling extensively for my consultancy on Islam and gender. I have fasted in strange and wonderful places, without the ability to control most of these secrets I will share, thus confirming their benefit.
Before you go to bed each night, figure out exactly what you want to eat in the morning. It is impossible to get the non-suhur person to THINK at 4 a.m. My children could be seen at various places in the kitchen just standing dumbstruck. Picture it: refrigerator door wide open and they standing there as if an egg sandwich will pop out at them like the drive through at McDonalds. If I ask them the evening before, and if what they said then was in response to what we actually had in our kitchen, then in the morning all that was needed was for those ingredients to make their way into their hands. Shortly thereafter, some form of consumption would proceed.
Go for the sure thing, the thing you know you like and the thing you know you can digest. Ramadan is not the month for early morning experimentation—iftar, yes, suhur no. If you have some strange and new desire to taste, say, eggs benedict and you’ve never had it before, the possibility that you would actually go through the procedure of making them and then decide they’re, like, the nastiest thing any one has ever done to an egg— what will you do? You won’t have time for another order of edible eggs, so don’t do it. Stick with the safe and sure.
I admit, my kids call me OCD (overly careful about details) in terms of a clean house including kitchen, but trust me, the kitchen needs to at least be clean enough that you can find the bowl you plan to eat your cereal in, so that it does not have left over caked-up spaghetti sauce from a late night snack. NObody—not even I the OCD, suhur diehard—wants to do dishes and wipe up a space to lay down your toast for butter and jam. So, clean up the night before. Maybe not OCD, but you get the drift: clean counter space enough for toast, a clean knife to butter it with, and a bowl or plate to eat out of or off of are a minimal requirement.
When I lived in Egypt, there was almost a second tier religious mandate to eat “ful mudamas” (fava beans) for suhur. The rationale was that it “lasted” longer in the stomach and I guess made you less hungry for the day long. Uh-Uh! This was NOT my cup of tea. I resorted to my good old American pastimes for the morning and accepted that in most cultures there is not a special breakfast food. People eat what they ate through out the day. In Asia, for example, this must include rice. I hate rice, so I would almost feel like I had no option for suhur if I did not go with my own cultural specificity.
I also go with my own personal preferences, even if they are counter productive to the rest of the day, according to the medical experts. Like that cup of tea. I have only one cup of caffeinated tea each day and that has to be in the morning. So when I get up I start the water and by the time the simple meal is prepared the water goes in the cup and a few minutes later, I put in two teaspoons of honey and some milk or cream, and boy, do I enjoy it. It does not keep me awake about an hour later when I take my morning nap, and it is a diuretic meaning I get no liquid benefit from it. I drink plain water for that, but this is the psychology of fasting (and of being a diehard). I get what I want and I am at peace that the fast is not some kind of torture. It’s just a regimen with a slightly different clock. So that is part of the secret. Eat and drink what you are accustomed to as a morning meal and you will find greater peace with having to do at an unnatural hour.
I remember traveling in Italy once, when all I could get as a near equivalent to my morning cup of Earl Grey was a tiny cup of cappuccino out of the vending machine. Made me all the more grateful to get back home with the tea kettle squeaking to announce my normalcy at that hour was back on track. It’s the little things, remember. Of course the little things can get screwed the wrong way too. A few years ago at a conference in Massachusetts some of us did start our fasting there although we were technically exempt as travelers. I remember assisting the organizers in getting the timing correct and the suhur diehards amongst us were given a nice gift bag full of nutritional options just before we went to bed in the hotel. Included in the package was fresh fruit, a bagel and cream cheese and yogurt, but no spoon or knife! Yes, I ate yogurt and spread cream cheese with my finger, it was part of the adventure.
The last secret should be self evident then: keep it simple. Make sure you have something that can go from preparation to consumption in less than ten minutes. I’ve gotten up for suhur with my friends who have servants who actually get up and make a whole elaborate thing each day. I’m so happy for them but at this point in time, I still gravitate to a nice whole wheat type of bread and as simple protein source, like veggie sausage in the microwave; or muesli and fruit. Of course, if you are wealthy enough to have a maid cook for you for suhur, by all means try the eggs benedict.
My best suhur experience ever was actually not at home with my family of non-suhur people but at the first ever conference of Islamic feminism in Barcelona. There were only a few of us diehards that got up for a simple suhur together and I was actually smitten by the possibility of doing this with other mature diehards and out having to force any one to get up, or to keep pace, while at the same time, consuming something close to my preferences. Afterwards, the organizer, Abdennur Prado, asked me if I would lead the fajr prayer for our small congregation. Nothing could be more natural; and yet in its own way, it was also special. I pray for more suhur opportunities like that: quiet, simple, devout, and over in a few minutes.
