1st Ramadan in the Middle East

This is my 3rd Ramadan away from home and my first one in this area of the world. I had iftar on the first day of fasting with friends of mine who have lived in the area for over 15 years and its definitely different from what i'm used to. They live away from downtown so as soon as they hear the adhan (aka call to prayer) they break their fast with dates and water and immediately start eating. I was given a cup of soup at the same time as the big meal and also gien desser. It was only after they finished eating that they prayed the sunset prayer, Maghrib. Back home, I break the fast with dates and water and then pray Maghrib. Dates are a complete sugar and by the time I finish praying, which is not more than 5-7 minutes, my body has started to digest the dates and water, making my body ready to digest a meal. Then i start off with hot soup. Then I can eat a meal. This is sooooo much easier on my body then to just start immediately eating food. Needless to say, that i had a headache after eating at my friend's house. Not to sound ungrateful, because i really thank her for making  the food and inviting me to eat with her and her family. It's just interesting to see the different ways people break their fast.
On the other hand, today i broke my fast with members of my Islamic study group. For the past couple of months we've been meeting once a week later in the evening, but decided to have the talk at the same time as the iftar during Ramadan. We broke the fast with dates and water and then prayed Maghrib. Then we ate a meal. After eating, we had the talk, which lasted about 20 minutes. Then we had dessert. This sequence of food is what i'm used to from back home. Eating dessert a while after eating a meal is easier on my body. In the past, when I've eaten dessert at the same time as the meal, would give me a headache. Most of the members of my study group are expats from the US, UK, and Canada. So they're used to breaking their fast the same way as I am.
Another big difference is the Taraweeh prayers. These are special prayers done after the last prayer of the day, Isha and are only prayed during Ramadan.Ok, so one thing that is similar is that these prayers are offered in the mosque/masjid right after the Isha prayer. The difference is the length of time used to pray these. Here, the taraweeh prayers started at around 7:45pm and finished about 8:45pm. A total of eight rak'ahs (unit of prayer from standing to kneeling) were prayed with about a 1-2 minute break between each of the 2 rak'ahs. In the states, on the other hand, taraweeh prayer rarely finished before 10:30 or 11pm. It will last for 8 rak'ahs BUT there is a longer break between each fo the 2 rak'ahs of prayer. After reaching the halfway point, there is a huge break that last anywhere from 20-45 minutes depending on the mosque/masjid. During this break, sometimes there is a small sermon on how to improve oneself during this month of forgiveness. Sometimes, there is a plea from the leaders of mosque to donate money to the mosque. My friends and i call it "the donation break". I can't blame them for appealing to members of the congregation in the month where we should donate money to good causes even more than we should during the rest of the year. Plus all the mosques are independently funded. But sometimes, I'm just so ready to pray and go home and donate money on my own time. I'm guessing donations are not needed here since the mosques are funded by the government (don't hold me to that-I could be totally wrong so please correct me). Anyways, I think it's sooo cool to finish all the prayers early and go home feeling relaxed from the prayers.

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