The first day of Ramadan for me during this global pandemic went – fine. I got up, I spent a couple of minutes with the family, I listened to the Qur’an, I went to prepare a few meals in the kitchen, I checked my emails. Everyone around me seemed to also be handling it quite smoothly: my sister was preparing for her university projects, my father was either performing tasbih or scrolling through social media, and my mother was moving between the kitchen and the television every once in a while. We were all trying to ignore (or forget) that this Ramadan was any different. Coronavirus? Global recession? Quarantine? Stress? It was not in the equation. Egyptian television still had a countless number of series and entertainment, and we were all privileged to have constant access to the Internet and social media to distract us from any lingering thoughts or feelings of hunger. The sense of living in a parallel reality was very much real. Everything was fine for a while, and if it wasn’t fine, we turn on the television, chat to our friends or family members online, or…
