Mr. Ahmad’s story

A long time ago I was in Almaty (Alma-Ata), Kazakhstan’s former capital and was interested in buying a cheap flat. I was introduced to Mr. Ahmad, a man in his mid to late 70s who wanted to sell his flat.

While chatting, I got to know Mr. Ahmad better and he shared his life story with me. What he had to say touched me deeply. He said he had been born in Dagestan and had been forced to leave his home, his family and his roots at the tender age of 16 and brought to work in Kazakhstan in the early 1950s.

Mr. Ahmad was a Muslim, but had been banned from performing any Islamic ritual, in public or in private up to 1991. He told me the system couldn’t break him and his faith and that he used to pray every night in his room, after locking the front door and pulling the blinds, and performed the 5 prayers all together.

Pausing in the midst of his story, he said he wanted to show me something very important to him. While I was thinking what awful life this poor man must have lead, he went to a dresser and opened one of the drawers.

He carefully took out an object wrapped in a scarf and brought it to me. I unwrapped the scarf and found a very old book, whose pages had gone crinkly from reading.  I saw the book was the Holy Qu’ran. Mr. Ahmad told me it was the only treasure he had and the only thing that he had left from his father.

Mr. Ahmad’s story shows that neither money, nor bullets can change someone’s personal beliefs. This isn’t just valid for Muslims, but also for the other religions.

Cultural values can be acknowledged or changed only through peaceful dialogue with other cultures and respect between the different parties. I am inviting everyone to take a seat at the round table of equality and contribute to the mosaic of cultures for the best of humanity.