Waking up at 3am is not as innocent as it
seems.
In Eastern cultures, it is a time of the
soul. An awakening to get up and pray. A time to feel one’s connection with the
life within.
Not that I do this very often, mind you. But
I am always aware of it when I wake up and see that it is 3am.
During the month of Ramadhan, those who are
fasting get up around that time for the morning meal – nowadays consisting
primarily of water, as no matter how long the days go on, one never feels like
eating at 3am I assure you. What IS
magical however, when the fuzziness of sleep is swept aside with Japanese green
tea (remarkably tasty at 3am) – is witnessing the sunrise.
It is a holy time, those wee hours, when the
world is still quiet, a time of tangible peace. When the dim rays of light
begin to creep over the horizon, one feels: ‘this must be what it was like when
creation began.’ Everything begins to come to life. Not the everything of
people getting up and minds shifting into gear as the stresses of the day happily
make their way to our shoulders – no. The everything of …creation. The trees
begin to rustle, as if the leaves awake to greet the sun. The birds – the
birds! (and in my neck of the woods, the roosters) – begin to sing. Happily!
Never do I hear a sad bird song in the beginning of the day. The birds wake up
and happily chirp their harmonious chorus that welcomes the day and all of us
to it.
And then, if one lives in a Muslim country,
the call to prayer sounds, and that too is a harmonious chorus that seems to
put words to the birds (and roosters) song: Praise. Gratitude. Peace.
Jasmin Webb
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