In a typical fasting day, his energy-sapping job consumes significant amount of his body nutrients. Surprisingly Hamisi has never missed a single day of fasting in the past couple of memorable Ramadans.
By Abdullahi Jamaa
A red bag of grain droops from his sheathed head as light sweats gently beads from the ageing face of Mr. Hamisi Bin Omar, a porter in Kenya’s port city of Mombasa.
“The work is hard, it is really hard” Hamisi tells of his job “I have been working like this for almost half of my entire life”
The sturdy physique of this bubbly father of three endured several decades of challenging hard job; yet it is a trade that has helped him pay his family bills- albeit in drips and drabs.
Born in 1963, Hamisi is strong both in mind and muscle; his endurance of this tough work is itself a powerful indication of the kind of person this innocent family man is.
But Hamisi is also a staunch Muslim who performs his Islamic duties with commitment and allegiance even as he deals daily with a hard job that consumes both his time and energy.
The holy fasting month of Ramadan is especially difficult time for many porters like him who have no option but to break their back for livelihood and sustenance.
During Ramadan, Hamisi like many others has no excuse but to tolerate his demanding occupation by abstaining from eating in order to observe this important fundamental tenet of Islam.
“In hard jobs, fasting is an option for few dedicated believers. It needs determination, courage and energy” he says “And you know there is no excuse in not fasting when you are healthy”
Back home he feeds four other mouths- that of his wife, two sons and a daughter; this leaves no chance for him to abscond his casual job. “And I have to fast, this is must for me as a Muslim, it is about staying true to my religion” he observes
His rigorous twelve hours of fasting involves lifting, packaging and storing a huge amount of irregular consignment in a commodity warehouse located in down-town Mombasa.
Yet Hamisi leaves nothing to chance in observing Ramadan even as his workmate occasionally admit falling out of fasting quite often. It is a do or die affair for most porters.
Weakness, dehydration as a result of sweating and headache are the common daily symptoms Hamisi has to prevail over as fasting in afternoon hours apparently gets harsher.
On his straining back, Hamisi handles at least 500 sucking sacks daily each weighing around 50kgs. This consumes a significant amount of body energy leaving him in sheer weakness throughout his fasting day.
“Sometimes we handle dozens of containers of commodities with thousands of bags”
In a typical fasting day, his energy-sapping job consumes significant amount of his body nutrients. Surprisingly Hamisi has never missed a single day of fasting in the past couple of memorable Ramadans.
His immediate supervisor, Mr. Omar Katune, a former porter himself takes on to narrate the challenges of a fasting porter.
“Most of the men here withdraw fasting or they do not fast at all, it is really hard for them, Mr. Hamisi is a dedicated believer who endures this hard job while fasting everyday without a single miss. Fasting requires a strong determination to hang on in order to defeat starvation and thirst”
But what is the science behind the endurance of fasting porters and other professions that demand a good flow of body energy throughout a working day.
For sure fasting is easily handled by white-collar professions than full time energy draining hard job doers like Hamisi.
Medical doctors say the human body is endowed with natural mechanism that enables the body to survive starvation and thirst especially during long hours of fasting.
Mombasa-based physician Dr. Asif Hussein Gulam, says one mechanism that helps a fasting person to endure hunger for longer hours is the secretion of hormone glucagon.
“Glucagon is a hormone that helps mobilize body energy during fasting periods and other times when the body is lacking food for some reasons” says Dr. Asif “It does this by maintaining glucose supply back into the bloodstream long after you eat”
Due to lack of intake of food by the fasting person blood glucose levels falls and glucagon is secreted from the alpha cells. This protein hormone causes the liver to release stored glucose from its cells into the bloodstream and then the fasting person remains energized by this natural process.
According to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the average person’s minimum calorie requirement per day globally is approximately 1,800 kilocalories. But people like Hamisi might need as much as 6000 kilocalories.
Dr. Asif advices fasting Muslims like Hamisi who are doing physical work to rearrange properly their meals and eat a balance diet during Ramadan’s non-fasting hours.
“Twelve hours of fasting will not kill you, but when you are doing this kind of job, the body needs quite of a lot of energy and that is why it is necessary to have a balanced diet”
Experts say the idea is not to eat extra food because that won’t help. Just take a balance diet and the body mechanism of regulating energy will take its cause and action.
Editor’s note: This story first appeared at Onislam.net during 2015 Ramadan
