A Fast Way to Teach Teen Peers About Islam

As the sun slowly descended toward the Pacific, Amin Momand watched it set, and half his teammates watched him watching it.

It was an early October team dinner the night before a Palos Verdes High School football game.

But Amin, a starting defensive end for the Sea Kings, couldn’t eat -- couldn’t even grab a sip of water -- until the sun disappeared.

When darkness finally came and he took a drink, there was a communal sigh of relief. Some teammates applauded. After excusing himself to pray, he returned to the table and joined teammates who had already dug into the pasta and pizza.

Amin’s physical and spiritual hardships the last few autumns have become common knowledge among his teammates -- most of whom still can’t understand how he trains and competes while abstaining from all food and drink during the day as part of the Islamic holiday month of Ramadan.

“There’s definitely an ‘Oh, wow!’ factor,” Amin said -- especially on hot days when he stands aside while other players get water. Or at this year’s homecoming game, held during the afternoon.

Ramadan, which ends Sunday, is tied to the Islamic month when God is believed to have revealed the Koran to the prophet Muhammad in what today is Saudi Arabia. Islam uses a lunar calendar, which shifts 11 days each year compared with the Western calendar. In the next few years, Ramadan will move through earlier September and then into August.

For the last two years, football season has overlapped with Ramadan -- adding an extra level of hardship for young Muslim athletes such as Amin.

“It’s a challenge I accept,” said Amin, 17. “If I couldn’t do both, I’d quit football before I quit fasting.”

Fasting is one of the “five pillars” of Islam set out in the Koran. Each year, millions of Muslims abstain from all forms of consumption -- food, liquids and smoking -- daily from dawn until sunset for the month of Ramadan.

The ritual has multiple meanings. Partially a test of discipline and devotion to God, the hunger and thirst pangs are reminders of the plights of the less fortunate. Ramadan is also meant to be a month of increased charity, extra prayer and a time to resolve lingering feuds.

Many Muslims begin fasting in some form at age 10; some exceptions allow for believers with health problems or those traveling long distances. Pregnant women also are exempt.

In the Arab and Muslim world, Ramadan dominates all aspects of life and often takes on festive qualities, with special TV shows and concerts. Work hours are shortened; productivity pretty much becomes nonexistent; families rush home for huge meals and then stay up all night.

But for Muslims in the West, the annual tradition has a different feel -- more of a lonely and deeply spiritual endurance race than a monthlong party.

“The fact that you don’t see people around you doing it does make it much harder,” Amin said.

A beefy senior, he has developed a variety of Ramadan survival skills and habits to get through the month. So has Malek Al-Marayati, a freshman defensive back at St. Francis High School in La Canada Flintridge. The key, Malek said, is to keep himself as distracted as possible until sunset.

“When I’m not doing anything, then there’s nothing to do but think about water,” he said.

Movies are a great way to kill time, he said, but theaters can be treacherous for those vulnerable to the smell of buttered popcorn.

Malek, 14, started fasting as at age 10 and first managed to make it through the whole month two years ago. Along the way, he’s learned that it’s best to spend his lunch hours studying in the library.

“I used to sit in the cafeteria and watch them eat,” he said of his friends, “but that didn’t help at all.”

During Ramadan, his parents, Salam and Leila, wake him around 5 a.m. each day for a hearty pre-dawn meal known as suhoor -- usually cereal or pancakes and lots of water.

His parents also checked in with the high school’s coaches before the season, telling them, “If you see he’s getting weak or dehydrated, then you have to make him break his fast.”

For Amin, who’s been competing and fasting for several years, his teammates and coaches are long accustomed to the idea. But after he joined the team, players razzed him about fasting, making a show of how much they enjoyed a cool Gatorade on a hot day.

Most games for Palos Verdes start about half an hour after sunset, giving Amin a chance to drink some water and Gatorade and eat a power bar. During daytime practices and games, he tries to keep up the same level of performance but admits that the fasting cuts into his stamina.

“I can run as fast as normal but not for as long,” he said.

For both Amin and Malek, the month also shines a brighter-than-normal spotlight on their religion, making them accidental ombudsmen for Islam. Both said they field more questions than usual during Ramadan about all aspects of the Muslim faith.

“The majority are about girls and sex,” Amin said.

Malek, perhaps because he’s dealing with a younger peer group, tends to field a different type of questions.

One friend asked, “Are you going to kill me?” (He was joking, but Malek let him know that he didn’t find it funny.)

Another student asked, quite seriously, if Malek was a terrorist; a third asked if being Muslim made him a vegetarian.

Both boys take a certain pride in performing an annual religious duty that most of their classmates regard as impossibly hard. This year, some of Amin’s classmates announced their intention to try fasting. .

“Of course, they chickened out as the month got closer,” he said.

ashraf.khalil@latimes.com