Navigating Ramzan

When navigating home, it’s a good practice to check which routes are open or simply set your home as the destination and let the phone do the rest. Initially, I thought GPS worked with the phone network—but I was wrong. However, to have fully functional navigation, you need map data.

This realization came when I was looking for a GPS device for my bicycle on AliExpress and noticed that they didn’t have SIM slots. Later, I stopped cycling and never bought the device. However, I did buy a Mi Band, and it served me well. Nowadays, every weekend, I plan to start walking and going to the gym again but lack the motivation. At least I have the sense not to buy gear before changing my lifestyle—though some days, I do check Garmin’s website to see what’s on offer.

Back to navigation—yesterday, I saw people turning back the wrong way, an obvious sign of a road closure ahead. I checked the route home, but all the alternatives were completely blocked. So, I thought, “lesser of the two evils." After being stuck in the same spot for 20 minutes, a few volunteers arrived, followed by traffic officers and then the regular police. The junction I was stuck at is near a Bohra Jamat Khana at the intersection of Shaheed-e-Millat.

Eventually, after a few more stops, the way cleared up.

Amid all this hubbub, I just realized that I never actually started the journey on the map—I had only checked for closures. One little thing I noticed the other day when I did start the navigation was that Google Maps greeted me with “Welcome home” at the end of the trip. I don’t know how many years this feature has been around, but I just realized it now.

Of course, on the first day of Ramzan, I won’t leave you with just how we navigate home in a literal sense. We navigate back to basics: Sabar and Shukar.

Sabar (صبر) → Patience, perseverance, endurance, or restraint.
Shukar (شکر) → Gratitude, thankfulness, or appreciation.

The day is for abstinence, and the night is for prayers. However, this month is not all bliss—one of the hardest things to navigate is determining when to start and end. Some minority sects follow a predetermined calendar, but many, at least here in Pakistan, rely on the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee—except, of course, for some people in Peshawar. I wonder how our neighbors in Iran, Afghanistan, India, and Bangladesh handle moon sighting.

People I know in the developed world say that multiple groups follow different days for the start and end of the month. Of course, some argue that science has advanced enough to calculate the exact visibility of the moon. I believe this is a community event—if the majority have placed their faith in the moon sighting committee, then let it be. Instead of debating, we should focus on gathering the blessings of this month.

Addendum: I write and ask ChatGPT to check for grammar and spelling. It gives corrections in American English, but my laptop was set to a different region. That is now fixed, with both set to American English.

Second, I am copy-pasting the table which ChatGPT gave me.

Key Differences & Patterns