Rabiul – What?

[Suhail]

The 25th of December is, as even the most ignorant, laid-back, good for nothing, illiterate dim-wit will tell you, Christmas Day; the day Jesus was born (according to popular Christian myth). When is Saint Valentine's Day? Most people will be willing to wager, without hesitation or a moments pause for thought, their life savings that it is on the 14th of February. Ask all romantics or for that matter non romantics, ask any Shabir, Imtiyaz or Rayhanah, from those in their earliest teens to those of us for whom youth is a collection of rapidly fading memories of a distant past, this question and others like it pose little difficulty.

I was testing a child whose parents took a keen interest in his school education. I asked him the dates of some historical events to which he fired back the answers unfalteringly.

"When was the Battle of Hastings?" I asked him.

"1066."

"The Great Plague?"

"1664 to early 1666. It claimed the lives of some 70’000 people."

"The Fire of London?"

"2nd to 5th September 1666. It started at Pudding Lane, 13’000 homes were destroyed."

"England's only World Cup Final victory?"

"1966, and weave never heard the end of it," he joked.

"First moon landing?"

"Neil Armstrong 1969."

"Span of the First World War?"

"1914 to 1918, treaty signed with Germany at Versailles in June, 1919."

"The birth of the Prophet Muhammad ?"

"Sorry?"

"When was the Prophet Muhammad born?" I paused to rephrase the question. "When was YOUR Prophet born?" I asked, laying emphasis on the your.

"Ah, yes, well, umm..." he began to falter.

I did not wish to embarrass him further. "He was born in the year referred to by the then Arabs as Aamul-Feel (The Year of the Elephant), corresponding to 571 CE (Christian Era), on the twelfth of Rabiul Awwal." I informed him.

"Rabiul-what?" he spoke as if he were articulating the words of an alien tongue.