JAKARTA It was the Islamic holy month of Ramadan in 2007. Gibran El Farizy, a student at the Bandung Institute of Technology in West Java in Indonesia, was starving.
Farizy's parents were late sending his monthly allowance of 600,000 rupiah (about $45 at the current exchange rate), and he barely had enough money to buy the cheap soft drink he wanted to break his fast with. For three days, he relied on a few dates and water to break the fast, and just water before dawn prior to resuming his fast the next day.
