CAIRO, Egypt -- Rageb Hassen was ready. His left hand held his spoon aloft, poised at mouth level. His right hand clutched the bowl of beans, preparing to raise it to the same altitude.
As soon as a cannon signaled the sun had set, his spoon, bowl and mouth reached a happy convergence, ending Rageb's third day of fasting for Ramadan.
The Islamic holy month began this week, starting 28 days of abstinence from food and drink between sunrise and sundown for the world's Muslims.
"It's not so hard," Mr. Hassen, a 20-year-old clothing vendor, said of the daily fast.
Across the table in an open courtyard near Cairo's el-Hussein mosque, soldier Ashraf Shabadeen, 26, said the hunger gnawed at him only for a few hours in the late afternoon.
"Some of the soldiers get pretty cranky," he said. "You have to just stay away from them."
Ramadan celebrates the Angel Gabriel's delivery of the verses of the Koran to the Prophet Mohammed.
The month begins with the sighting of the month's new moon and ends with a feast.
It is a singular time in the Arab world, a time when the hungry are fed, the poor are given alms, and the feuding people of the region feel momentarily united by a common bond -- be it the call of religion or of empty stomachs.
For the religious, Ramadan is a time they say they feel closer to God.
"Part of the beauty of this month is the whole routine is different," said Fawziya Hussein, 35, at an open-air table.
Her three children stared territorially at the baked pita bread, the appearance of which had so slowed the last minutes before the meal could begin.
"This is the month for Allah, and people are very happy to fast for him," their mother said.
Even those who do not perform the added nighttime prayers in the mosque value Ramadan as a time when families come together for "iftar," the sundown meal that breaks the fast.
The object of the fasting is to cleanse the soul, prove devotion to God and understand the suffering of the poor.
And the sharing is spontaneous and genuine: Strangers walking past iftar meals are besieged with invitations to sit down.
Wealthy Egyptians pay for community meals; the poor simply take their place at any of hundreds of tables set with food throughout the city each evening.
"The Egyptian family has a chance to reunite at the table," said Umam Mayad, waiting outside the mosque for the men to finish praying.
Good Muslims do not eat, drink or smoke during the day, do not listen to music, and they resist enjoying any sensory pleasures, including sex.
It does not go down well with everyone.
"For the whole bloody month I can't get a decent drink," complained one Egyptian, unrepentant of his vice but not willing to have it recorded by his name.
There is a measure of social coercion.
Even Christian Egyptians eat discretely in the day, to avoid accusing stares. Only tourists -- and the college kids who still pack McDonald's -- openly flaunt the rules.
Many Muslims turn their days upside down: sleeping through the daylight fast to come awake as sundown approaches.
"The whole lifestyle changes," said Dr. Madiha el-Safty, an expert on Arab culture at the American University of Cairo.
Daytime business hours shorten, and the work pace slows to a crawl. For Egypt's stultified bureaucracy, the slowdown is paralyzing. A recent study reported that the average government bureaucrat works 27 minutes each day -- before starting the Ramadan crawl.
"If you have something to be achieved, especially with the government, you try not to do it during Ramadan," said Dr. Safty.
Humbugs complain that Ramadan is justification for malingering, missed deadlines and ignored appointments. Some of those who do work spend a fair part of it grousing, which misses the whole point, said Dr. Safty.
"You're not supposed to complain about it. It sort of refutes the whole thing when you complain," she said.
Each Ramadan day in Cairo ends in the same pattern, as rhythmic and beguiling as a graceful dance. In the late afternoon, traffic starts to get faster. Exciting smells begin drifting from food stalls. Boys scoot about on bicycles balancing impossibly large trays of bread and beans.
The bustle builds to a frenzy before 5:30, as people rush to join their families or -- at least -- an inviting table of strangers. The ubiquitous guard shacks manned by army conscripts suddenly empty, as the soldiers head to the closest public meal.
At 5:35, all is quiet but for transistor radios tuned for the signal of the cannon. Food sits on plates, spoons gripped in hands. The cannon sounds, and for the next 15 minutes, there is no activity but mass eating. Stores are left empty, the streets are deserted. The city sighs in quiet satiation.
As darkness takes hold, Cairo again comes alive. The streets are festive. Ramadan lamps -- the gaudier, the better -- swing from strings of colored lights. Friends gather in a good mood over laden tables, as the eating continues.
The twin staples of hospitality in the Middle East -- tea and coffee -- re-emerge and are gratefully sipped in a haze of cigarette smoke.
"I do a great business in Ramadan," said Kawther Suliman, who boils tea in an old milk can on the sidewalk and sells it for 8 cents a glassful. She even rinses the glass between customers. "Some people drink four, five or six glasses right after iftar."
The television stations put on Ramadan entertainment. Movie houses open their premier shows. The bigger restaurants lay on lavish spreads for parties that extend to "sohour," the last meal before dawn.
Islamic clerics, so often dour fellows with dark glasses, dense beards and deep scowls, think little of this celebration. The grand sheik of Al-Azhar, the foremost Muslim official, opened this Ramadan by preaching against the sins of the evenings.
Much of the entertainment is "infested with obscenity and immorality," said Grand Sheik Gadul Haq Ali Gadul Haq. Television is distracting from devotion. Big iftar meals are wrong, and whiling away the daylight hours by sitting idly in cafes and staring at women wipes out the benefit of abstinence, he said.
But the mood of the Ramadan evenings seemed undimmed.
Throughout, the people saluted their neighbors with the traditional greeting: "May God accept your fast. And have a delicious iftar."