| Len's cousin
Finding a Koran
And we had fields that we used to make our own hay for our cattle that we had. And I was sent out to these, to the hay farm And I was sent out to this farm, to the hay farm to help out in making hay. And I was the only white man among all the natives there in this community. And they were very much afraid of me, that I am a Russian spy, because to them, they didn't make a distinctions between a Jew, a Pole, a Russian. To them, we were all Russian. And a Russian is no good! They had no confidence in me, and they used to hide from me.
Like, they used to do all kinds of monkey business. They take [?] cattle and kill for meat, but they did it all when I wasn't around, because they were afraid I might squeal, or something. And no matter how much I tried to tell them that I need a little bit of meat as much as they do. Nothing doing. They used to hide.
And, it went on for a long time like this, until one day. I was sent to this farm, and while we were making the hay, they had a few old huts, abandoned. You see, there they make a hut, it lasts for only a few years, because it's mud houses. And the rain, the monsoon rains come and they soak it through, it falls apart many times, so they go and build another one. Because all it is is mud, so it's no problem with them. Very little wood they use, because there is no wood in there. Wood is at a premium. Sometimes, all they could find is on a window, where they make a little hole for the window, so they put a little wood, or in the door sometimes it might be very little.
And we were taking apart an old hut, because we thought there might be a little bit of wood in there. For the wood, we took it apart. And in the window, that was there when we were looking for the wood, it was hidden an old Koran, a [word inaudible] book. The Moslem Bible, you know. So, an old Koran was hidden in this wall where the window was, underneath of the window, we found a Koran.
When we found the Koran, all of a sudden, I found out there was one fellow that apparently was knowledgeable in the Koran. You see, these people are speaking Turkish. The Koran was written in Arabic. So, you see, that fellow knew the writings of the Koran. So, in other words, he was a learned man. Before, I didn't know that. For me, it was a fellow worker. But all of a sudden.... And then I realized that he was a mullah. He was one of their learned men. And he used to take the kids, the young kids, every night, and he used to have lessons in the Koran with them. By heart, before. When I found this Koran. He used to take the Koran, and learn them chapters from the Koran.
I was not supposed to know about it, because they were hiding from me, because, you know, the Koran was forbidden, same as you are not supposed to teach Hebrew in Russia. The Koran was forbidden too. I don't know how that Arafat could go and kiss [word inaudible] the leaders of Russia, after what they tried to do to their Muslims. But somehow, they do it.
Anyway, I found out that he's teaching the kids from the Koran, and I told him that, if he wouldn't mind, I would like to sit in and hear what he has to say. I was really interested to know what the Koran says. And at the beginning, of course, he denied the whole thing. He says, "What to you mean, Koran? Don't you know that we are not allowed to read the Koran?"
I said, "I know you are not allowed to read the Koran, but you do."
He says, "No, no." I went for him days, you know. Please, I want to hear it. Well, finally I got him to. He couldn't get away from it. He said, "OK." In the evening after supper, he says, we meet in a hut there [several words inaudible]. And, to them, the Koran also, if they teach, the same as the Christians, they got like and Old Testament and a New Testament. With them, they got an Old Testament, a New Testament, and then the staber [phonetic] Koran. Like, they recognize Jesus, you know.
So, anyway, he started to talk to them. He was telling them the story of Abraham. Of course, he was interested in Ismael. So he was telling them that Abraham had a son, his name was Ismael, and he sent it away with Orgol [sic] to the desert. And he ended with that. That was the end of Abraham.
And I didn't say nothing, but then when the kids went away, so I called him up and I told him, "I would like you to explain to me something. You know, we are reading the same Bible," I said, "and we know all the story about Abraham, too."
And he looked at me in amazement. He never believed that a Russian knows anything about Abraham. See, it's their domain, you know. [In] the Koran, only they they are the people of the Book. We don't know anything. Then I said, "You know, if I remember correctly, my teacher used to teach me that Abraham also had a son Isaac. What happene to Isaac? You never told your kids about it." And then I said, "Isaac had Jacob, you know. You are cutting it all out. How do you continue the Old Testament Bible if you don't mention, Isaac?"
And he got upset. And he started to yell. He wasn't arguing anymore. He was literally venting his anger. "What does a damn Russian know about the Bible?" he said, to come and tell him what it says. "That's a desecration of the Bible," he says, "when a Russian talks about the Bible." And he was yelling. I couldn't calm him down.
I seen that there was no use to talk to him, because when a man tries to reason with you, you can understand hiim. But when he says you are ignorant, and you don't know anything, it's no use. And I left it at that. I went away.
The next day, we were all sitting — that was supper, yes, we were sitting and eating. We used to eat a commune supper. We always used to eat together. So, he's telling his co-workers, the Muslims, the elderly people, and he says, "You know, this damn Russian," — that's the way he called them, the damn Russians— "this damn Russian, you know, knows about the Bible." And they all looked at him in amazement. "You know," he says, "he isn't such a bad man the way we thought he is."
See, if you know about the Bible all of a sudden, you're not that bad. We don't know that we get cut [sic] out way before he does, and his Koran doesn't mean a thing to us. Because, if you know the Bible, you must also be a religious...
[end of this side of the tape]
"...because, you know, he even corrected me on the Bible." And he says, in their language, he was swearing, and he said, "You know, this so-and-so fellow, he even corrected me. I even forgot about Isaac," he said, "and he corrected me, and he was right! He [word blurred] me and he was right."
And, you know what, since then, they took me in into their confidence, and I became one of them. They never tried to hide from me anything. Anything they did, they talked to me openly, and I was really one of them, you know. But until then, they never trusted me. They were so much afraid, you know. But that Bible helped me out an awful lot. The Koran.
Sonia; In that metrie [phonetic] you were getting even with them.
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