Ramadan diary: Fasting is shorter but colder during Melbourne’s winter

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  9:34am - Tasneem checks her email as she rides the train into Melbourne city.

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  9:54am - Tasneem makes her way to a meeting with the Parliamentary Secretary for the Attorney General regarding a proposed discussion paper on Australian citizenship.

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  12:31pm - After her meeting with the immigration department, Tasmeen walks down Lonsdale Street in Melbourne with Joumanah El Matrah, chief executive of Australian Muslim Women’s Centre for Human Rights, as they prepare for their next meeting.

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  3:08pm - Tasneem checks her diary in her home office as she completes her work day.

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  5:49pm - Tasneem arrives at the Australian Football League Ramadan Dinner and meets with her friend Toltu Tufa, founder of Afaan Publications.

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  6.08pm - Tasneem watches on as the official proceedings get under way at the 2015 Australian Football League Ramadan Dinner.

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  7:39pm - Tasneem leaves the Punt Road Oval with her friend Rima Darwiche to return home for the night.

It is the middle of winter in Melbourne, Australia’s most southerly mainland city, and for Tasneem Chopra that means a wet and chilly Ramadan with temperatures that dropped to 7°C over the weekend.

Tasneem, 45, is a cross-cultural consultant with “three amazing children”.

She lives in the northern suburb of Fawkner and prays at the Coburg Islamic Centre, just a short distance away.

For Tasneem, the holy month is “an opportunity to spiritually reset, reflect and reconnect ​with my Creator, improving myself from the inside out”.

With the fajr prayer just after 6am and maghrib at 5.19pm, her fast lasts for 11 hours, which is four hours shorter than it is in the UAE.