Spiritual Wealth and Physical Ill Health

Those returning from the pilgrimage in Mecca usually bring home dates and water from the well of zam-zam for relatives and friends. This time they've also brought something less welcome: new diseases.

March 25, 2003

It has been three weeks since Giwangkara first felt his throat was dry and itchy. He was also coughing hard. His chest was congested and his voice was hoarse, a sign that a disease had inflicted his vocal chords. Haji Giwangkara became sick after returning from Mecca. Along with 200 other pilgrims in a group he led, this executive of a haj pilgrimage travel bureau had just come home from performing the fifth tenet of the Islamic religious p

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