Celebrating Ramadan at Canada’s ‘Little Mosque on the Tundra’

INUVIK, Canada (Reuters) – Muslims who broke the Ramadan fast together this week at the Midnight Sun Mosque in Canada’s Arctic had home-cooked Sudanese food in a tranquil space surrounded by stunning scenery.

But it wasn’t for everyone.

“I’m stuck. Every year, I get up, I go, ‘This is my last year in Inuvik,’” said Abadallah El-Bekai, a Lebanese-born Palestinian who laughed as he recalled his attempts to leave the community in Canada’s Northwest Territories, where he has lived for 25 years.

“God didn’t allow me to go. Perhaps I made sins in my life, God sent me here!” the 75-year-old said.

The Midnight Sun Mosque, commonly known as the “Little Mosque on the Tundra,” was established in August 2010, in response to the rising number of Muslim Canadians migrating north in search of work.

It is built in Winnipeg, Manitoba, then trucked 4,000 kilometers north.

It now stands as the northern-most mosque in the Western Hemisphere.

Saleh Hasabelnabi, the imam, has been living in Inuvik for 16 years. He told AFP that the congregation is no longer growing, but was stable at around 100 to 120 members.

Muslims living near the Arctic Circle have difficulties practicing their faith, especially when it comes to following a prayer schedule based on where the sun is placed.

Inuvik enjoys 24-hour sunlight for over 50 days a year, and polar nights — or no direct light — about 30 days of the year.

“The first time was a shock, like a. I can’t believe. The first time in my life, I pray five times, and the sun is still up,” Hasabelnabi said while reminiscing about his first summer in Inuvik.

The community has established a rule that it follows local time in Mecca, Islam’s holiest city.

Mohamed Asad Behrawar, an accountant who recently moved to Inuvik, said adapting to the white nights was not hard for him because he had previously lived in Edmonton, the capital of Alberta, which also has long summer days.

“But it’s still difficult to acclimate yourself to this environment. It’s a bit hard,” the 36-year-old told AFP.

Despite cold weather, members met at the Midnight Sun on Sunday to break fast — on the third day of Ramadan.

They brought scores of chicken-only dishes, rice and assorted other food in containers and sat together, one of whom, El-Bekai, who was so hungry to leave this place, ate with cheer, chatting.

Inuvik has a population of roughly 3,400 people, and the congregation of Midnight Sun includes Canadians who arrived as refugees, got here and moved north in search of larger paycheques.

Many work as taxi drivers in the community south of the tree line.

Abdul Wahab Saleem, a 37-year-old Islamic scholar who was visiting from Edmonton, said the Muslims in Inuvik were a “visible minority.”

“If you walk around outside you will find Muslims everywhere, every time you take a cab, most probably you take a Muslim,” he said.