Muslims in northern Russia are facing extra challenge to their faith as they will fast for 22 hours daily.
The Muslims in St Petersburg and elsewhere in northern Russia will eat for only two hours and fast for the rest 22 hours daily.
According to some St Petersburg Muslim authorities, it is due to the long-lasting daylight in the city.
“Muslims see this as a test. They will wait 21-22 hours to break our fast. They will eat for only two to three hours,” said an employee of the St Petersburg and Northwest Regional Muslim Spiritual Centre, who declined to give his name.
When asked about the difficulty of keeping to this strict schedule, he said it was no burden for the faithful. “Islam is a way of life,” he said. “For us, fasting is the same as getting up in the morning and brushing your teeth.”
Yelizaveta Izmailova, an administrator at a local school, said her parents, brother, sister and husband all observed the Ramadan fast with her, following a schedule handed out each week at the central mosque.
“This month, the time for breaking the fast is really late. We don’t eat or drink from the morning prayer, at about two in the morning, until the sun goes down at around 10pm,” Izmailova said, explaining that twilight typically arrived as late as 10.30pm in June.
“Of course, this is a heavy burden for the human body, but every Muslim makes this choice consciously.”
Although there are no exact figures on how many Muslims live in St Petersburg, last year’s Eid al-Fitr festivities, which mark the end of Ramadan fasting, drew 42,000 worshippers to the city’s two main mosques, according to the interior ministry.
As often happens on major holidays, most could not fit inside and had to take part from the street.
Some Muslim scholars have written that residents of northern regions can forgo the fasting ritual, which is meant as a way to strengthen the will and rule over desires.
Other religious literature suggests that Muslims living in the far north can observe the Ramadan fast according to the time of sunrise and sunset in Mecca or the nearest Muslim city.
In many cases, those performing hard manual labour don’t fast for safety reasons. Many of the Muslims in St Petersburg are migrants from former Soviet republics in central Asia and the Caucasus working in construction and other low-wage industries. The labour ministry approved a quota of 164,000 migrant workers in St Petersburg in 2014, but the actual number is likely to be much higher.
Shakir, a metal-worker originally from Tajikistan, said generally only the elderly and those without work followed the fast in St Petersburg.
“I have a hard job, I can’t observe it,” he said.
“The day is long, and you can’t drink water or eat before the sunset. For that reason not everyone observes it … There aren’t any white nights where most Muslims live,” he said.
