Life in the Fast Lane

Today is Karva-Chauth, the ladies’ day of fasting for the long life of the husband. On this day, married women(and probably, engaged ones too) go the whole day without food, and water , breaking the fast only after seeing the moon, and offering water to it.
This festival has been celebrated in countless hindi movies and tv soaps, with the wife fondly gazing at the husband thru a sieve, and then breaking her fast. In real life, they don’t really do that, as many ladies have blushingly told me---they only look at the moon thru the sieve.
It is the going without water that is truly admirable, since it is still quite warm at this time of the year. Ideally, they are supposed to get up before daybreak, and have something to eat---it is usually a lot of fried and sweet stuff, given by the mother-in-law. Around four in the afternoon, the ladies gather at some common place ( a park, or someone’s house) , sit in a circle and do a pooja, passing their pooja plate around in the circle, sing a certain song, until each lady gets back her plate. A “katha” is also recited, in which all the dire things that happened to a woman who did not observe this fast, are listed. They may then have a little tea ( which does not count as water!). The more determined ones do not have even tea.(I feel that is sensible, since tea would only aggravate the acidity, if any). The ladies give a gift to their mom-in law ( a sort of thanksgiving for giving birth to hubby!).
It is not a holiday, but some working ladies take the day off. Some make it a point to go to work, since they feel it’ll take their minds off the hunger pangs. Kids are happy in school on this day, because the teachers conserve their energy by not speaking much, so pandemonium may well reign.
These days a lot of husbands have taken to fasting along with their wives---so sweet, na? Twenty-first century protocol?