228
is joyfully welcomed. Those who have begun to join in the fast while still young can endure the daily abstinence without much effort, if not required to do any heavy work during this month, and if allowed to accomodate their occupations to the change of living which the fast involves. The nights of the Puasa in an Achehnese gampōng are full of noisy merriment, especially among the young men in their own particular sphere, the meunasah. With this in view, these combined clubs and chapels are put into some sort of order at the end of Shaʿbān. They are cleaned up—which they require only too much—the big lamp is brought out and hung up etc.
The Fast.9. Puasa (Ramadhān). The month, like the day, begins at sunset. We have seen[1] how in old times the commencement of the day was announced in the capital of Acheh by the firing of a gun from the Dalam, and how the right of firing this shot (nòbah) was regarded as one of the high prerogatives of the sultan. Such was also the case with the sunset that began the fasting month; but seven shots were fired to call attention to this important epoch. On the subsequent days of the fast the customary single shot was thought sufficient, and served as a signal for the universal bukah (the breaking of the fast).
The Mohammedan law does not brook the most trifling breach of the prescribed abstinence. The smallest particles of solid or liquid food or the smoke of tobacco or opium entering the body between the earliest dawn and sunset make the fast day null and void and render it necessary to repeat it later on. As regards the breaking of the fast, each one may follow his own inclination, but it is considered sunnat or commendable to take some food immediately after sunset, and equally so to have another meal before the break of day. This latter is called sawō (a corruption of the Arabic saḥur) by the Achehnese.
That none may miss the time for preparing and eating the sawō-meal, the great drum (tambu) in the chapels is beaten at intervals from 1 to 3 A.M. In the days of the sultanate an additional warning was conveyed by means of a cannon-shot (called sambang[2] fired about 4 A.M. to warn the people that "a white thread might now be told from a black," as the text of the Qurān has it, i.e. that the time of the sawō had come to an end.
