August finished yesterday, which means that all those Madrileños who ran away for the hottest month are now back at work. I must admit, I was struggling to get back into the swing of things last week.
It's also the first day of Ramadan - thanks to Buj Al Arab for the reminder. Buj asks what Ramadan is like here in Spain. To be honest, it's like nothing at all. I have not seen a mosque or heard a call to prayer since I've been here. There are Muslims, obviously, but I don't know where they live and they seem to maintain a very low profile.
Anyway: ¡Ramadan Kareem!
If Wishes Were Horses, Beggars Would Ride
4 days ago
1 comment:
Low profile indeed, unfortunately every time the Muslim community tries to get together and build a mosque in Spain, they are invariably turned down for permission. In Seville the community has been fighting for years and have only just been allocated an area...in the industrial complex just outside the city. When the Saudis and Emiratees funded a new mosque in Granada, they had to promise that the muezzin would do the call old style, unamplified. The rest are condemned to praying in illegal garage mosques around the country.
As anyone who has lived in Spain for awhile knows, that while the constitution claims that it is an aconfessional state, we all know which comes up when you look up the word religion in the Real Academia dictionary.
If you are interested in seeing a little Islamic Spain in Madrid, there is quite a big mosque just across the M-30 near Avenida de America I think.
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