I asked the salesman at the fruit counter to taste the watermelon for me as I wanted one that was really syrupy sweet for my Iftar table.

The last time I had picked up this huge fruit and tapped on it and listened carefully just like the salesman said, but that did not help and it turned out tasteless and insipid. Luckily, no one around me had started a hip hop dance when I drummed on it.

“There should be a deep, bass sound,” said the salesman — obviously a musician who probably jams after work.

It was Ramadan and no one was eating grapes like they usually do at the fruit section while ignoring a hand-written sign that said, “No tasting fruit.” It was still seven hours to sunset.

Watermelon, I had read somewhere, is a magical fruit; it slakes your thirst as it is not only 92 per cent water, but also contains host of antioxidants and nutrients.

The salesman looked at me wide-eyed at my request as he offered me a slice of the watermelon on a sharp knife. I looked away briefly and when my gaze returned on him, he had disappeared. One moment he was standing there and the next moment he was gone.

Puzzled, I asked his colleague where the guy had gone, and he pointed down. I had to lean over the counter and peek and there he was on his haunches and tasting the watermelon slice. He looked like he was committing a crime.

He then stood up, gave me the thumbs up and wrapped the watermelon in plastic.

The other day I wanted to attend a talk at the local photography club given by a Hong-Kong based Filipina who had started off as a street photographer and turned into a documentary maker, now filming the bleak lives of human-trafficking victims.

She took up street photography as her mother could never go out and see the sights of Honk Kong.

The only problem was that the talk was at 4.30pm, around two hours from iftar, the time of ending the day’s fast. “I will not be able to drive back in time, just give me a few dates and a bottle of water,” I told my wife.

She put the foodstuff in a plastic bag, but I said it looked silly carrying a shopping bag to a talk, so I transferred the bottle, dates and a packet of salted biscuits to a fancy black cloth bag I had bought at Oasis Centre.

Halfway through the talk, as the photographer was talking about how dangerous it was to shoot in Mindanao, a part of Philippines that is over run by rebels, a dark, wet spot started spreading on my left leg and drops of water started to fall on the tiled floor.

It was still hours to go before Iftar and I froze not knowing what to do. Water was openly dripping from my bag now. I could not open my bag, take out the water bottle and close the lid properly, as I had never got into trouble with the authorities before.

I wanted to ask the documentary maker a couple of questions, but as the club member started to thank everyone for coming, I stood up and ran out of the warehouse into the hot and humid sunny afternoon dripping water as a security guard watched me curiously.

I am not sure why I get into such delicate situations during Ramadan, but once at an Iftar party, as we were waiting patiently for the prayer to start, I quickly picked up a date and was about to pop it in my mouth when the guy next to me tightly held my hand. “The prayer call is from Saudi Arabia on the TV,” he said.

Mahmood Saberi is a freelance journalist based in Dubai. You can follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ mahmood_saberi.