After the mélédé, the time of fasting

Mélédé was the name of the great fire lit with the evening prayer before the first Ramadan. It was a fire announcing that Ramadan had begun, and that fire was a great ceremony, ritual, proclamation and threshold of entry into Ramadan.

In Siirt, festivals meet fire not only in the Ramadan mélédé but also in the Cigor festival. Of that tradition, though, not a trace remains now. But in the period I lived through, it was celebrated on the second Monday of March. After the evening adhan, everyone would again light a torch (sûké) made of wood prepared days beforehand and begin to swing it from their own roofs. The movements of light created by all the torches being swung together on the roofs brought to life an interesting spectacle with the participation of the whole city. In time the explosion sounds of cork guns and toy rockets joined this spectacle, and after this noisy, fire-visual show lasting between half an hour and an hour, bumbars cooked at home and yellow twisted sweets were eaten with relish, and so the people of the city would have taken part, as the city's inhabitants, in a festival whose purpose and meaning were not known.

Because of geographical or cultural proximity there may be those who link it to the Magians or to other Near Eastern cultures that sanctify fire, but in neither the mélédé nor the cigor was the sanctification of fire ever in question. On the contrary, here, especially in the former, what was sanctified was Ramadan itself. By placing a great fire between before and after Ramadan, perhaps the symbolism of a fire marking a forbidden zone, which is in the nature of Ramadan, was displayed. Fire was a boundary between the lawful and the unlawful area, a bismillah.

The Ramadan mélédé, as a similar form, later began to be seen in many places on account of Nevruz celebrations, but only as a large fire lit in the square and jumped over. Of course no similar youth organization is made for the wood of the fires lit for Nevruz. The intentions of those who light the Ramadan mélédé, their preparations and the meaning they load onto it are also very different. For the Nevruz fire, perhaps wood gathered in a short time and car tires are used, and the Nevruz fire is put together quickly. Because of the tires and petroleum waste, the smoke rising from the Nevruz fire is too black.

Of course, as much as the Ramadan mélédé itself, the never-ending work of the neighborhood youth preparing for it over 15-20 days was very important. How did those young people follow the calendar? How did they learn that Ramadan was approaching and manage to organize among themselves at that age? How did a whole city take part in such a game, without leaving anyone out? A game, but one that everyone took very seriously and in whose cooperation no one shirked the role that fell to them. The young people took the work they did very seriously. At that age they were taking on the mission of representing the neighborhood.

In fact, in the first instance the motivation was exactly this. Rather than the meaning and importance of Ramadan, the rivalry between neighborhoods and the neighborhood identity formed in the neighborhood children during this rivalry. When a group forms, leadership forms in the group too; some come to the fore over the others and lead. Thus, already at a child's age, people go beyond selfishness and acquire the culture of being a group, of creating belonging, of undertaking a task that concerns the neighborhood beyond themselves, of solidarity.

One way of collecting money was to stop passers-by on the road and ask them for money. Another was to go from house to house, reciting eulogies in chorus to the household and demanding wood, skewers (pejik) or money. Even if something was to be given from the houses whose door was knocked on, it was not given at once, there was some coyness, so that the children's praises for the household's pampered children would go on and on. For instance, a mani like this would come:

Hayyé meyyé khelfi'l beyt

Alla'y khelli nés il'beyt

Likén 'acîn kı'khtamar

Salkén ibén kemel amar

(The snake is not behind the house

May God spare the people of the house

You have fermented dough

Now you have a son like the moon)

All children were in fact pampered. That is why the general saying is "Alla'y xallii'm dellél, aaamiin" (May God preserve the pampered one of your house, amen). Still, the group, carried away with excitement, would name the children of the house one by one: "Alla'y xalli İsmail, amin" "Alla'y xalli Hammet, amin". If the house had young men in military service, prayers were said for their safe return. When twigs were thrown from the roof by the lady of the house, the prayer would continue in chorus and a storm of applause would break out.

Although there was a race between neighborhoods over how high the fire would rise, we said there was no cutthroat rivalry, but in the 15-20 day preparation process it was impossible for the groups' paths not to cross. There, in keeping with human nature, a sweet and fun rivalry would inevitably come into play. Sometimes the race was not at all a gentlemanly one. In fact, in the course of the process things could heat up a lot, and raids could be organized to steal wood collected by other neighborhoods from where it was hidden, watching for a moment of heedlessness. For this reason it was very important that the gathered brushwood be stored in a suitable and protected place. This rivalry between groups sometimes caused elders to step in and to teach values such as ethics, morals and street code on this occasion.

The activities did not always remain limited to one's own neighborhood. Inter-neighborhood visits were also made. It was a challenge, or a mani recited with the courtesy of asking permission: "Cine cine cine, cine limlahllitkén" (We came, we came, we came, we came to your neighborhood). That, together with communication among the neighborhood groups, this turned in time into an event spreading across and drawing in the whole city created a really interesting situation. Everything continued with this collective participation until the Ramadan starting fire was lit. Then the fire would burn and Ramadan would begin with all its spiritual atmosphere, separated by a sharp line from the time that is not Ramadan.