DAWN SERVICE
An old trick of journalists reporting on big crowds is to ask a cop how many people are gathered. Unless there are controlled entrances to the venue the police guess is usually as good as the journos, but the copy will pass sub-editor scrutiny if it includes the sentence: ‘Police estimated the crowd as more than 10,000’.
There were no police to be seen in Malang’s alun-alun (town square] at the dawn service to mark the end of fasting on 13 May, so we can only report ‘big numbers’. The overflow from the 120-year old Masjid Jami (Great Mosque) spilled into the closed streets where families kept prayer mats and their new clothes clean by spreading the black-top with newspapers – and leaving them behind when the 20-minute prayers were over. Not all stayed for the broadcast sermon but got away early as the roads were congested.
Among the many incongruities were balloon sellers wandering along the prayer lines.
I was probably the only bule ( Caucasian] present and inappropriately dressed as we'd cycled to the city centre - but no glowering or muttering. A soberly festive event.
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