that can't be halal

[aruan]

The imam at our company mosque - it's tiny but has all the requisite domes, vaulted architecture and a minaret, and sits in the courtyard of the Abu Dhabi Media newspaper complex - jazzed up the calls to prayer today, stretching out some vowels and getting fancy with some lilting repetition of syllables. He's slowing down some verses and setting others to a rhythm, and I wonder about the legality (the calls sound identical in any part of the city) while hoping he'll do it again tomorrow.

It was an odd thought, to have been in Abu Dhabi so long that I know the five-a-day routine. Actually, it's taught me a valuable lesson: I can never be a Muslim, having found the sunrise call, which roughly translates to "Wake up! God is great, and worship is better than sleep!" and comes about 4:30 a.m. nowadays, quite the prudent reminder - to go to bed.