Yesterday morning, for the call to morning prayer, As-Sobh, which marks the start of the fast, I got up.
The balcony of the hotel overlooks the main boulevard Houphouët Boigny, and it’s a view I love, with its succession of slightly (very) peeling white facades, terraces and satellite dish domes, a mixture of old buildings from the 1930s (unfortunately not maintained enough), traditional Moroccan houses and, from time to time, a slightly more modern building. On the right, in the distance, a minaret. And in the background, facing us, the silhouette of the mosque, like a ship heading towards the city.
But yesterday morning, in a whitish, silent, cottony atmosphere, in a thick mist that hung low over Casablanca, the mosque had disappeared.
Completely disappeared…
For a moment I thought it was an illusion, a remnant of sleep. I tried to catch a glimpse of it, to make out in the thick fog at least the silhouette of the minaret, normally visible from several kilometres away.
But nothing.
And then suddenly, in the silence, the voice of the muezzin pierced the fog, even louder, even more present for being just a voice, just a sound proclaiming the greatness of God (these are the first words of the prayer, Allahou Akbar, God is great), coming from nowhere, out of the clouds and the sea.
And little by little the other mosques responded. The morning began.
But the mosque didn’t appear until mid-morning, the clouds gradually rising. You could see its roof, and above the mist, the top of the minaret. All day long, the mosque was not fully visible. The mist always concealed part of it. It was hot, very hot, 32°, much hotter than normal for October, and that made Ramadan even more difficult.
In the evening, the mist was lighter. And for the last prayer of the day, you could make out the glow from the top of the minaret.
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