Diary 1963 - Murshid Sam's Living Stream

Diaries 1963November 9, 1963My dear Vince and Jane:I hope you won’t be bored by a chatterbox. I am trusting that you are weathering a lot ofmixed-up conditions and that you don’t mind my conclusion that as goes California Agriculture, sogoes the world. I have not been able to convince the so-called “Council of California Growers” butthat ends the frustrations—excepting that to be a one-man UN is a hopeless task unless you havesomething. Well, I have just outlined: Project: “The Garden of Allah” and I am writing to you nowbecause my closest friend, Major M. Sadiq, has written he expects to be here about the middle of nextmonth and wants to tour the State covering all phases of agriculture, including Sheep Industry withwhich I am not acquainted at all.Project: “The Garden of Allah” began with another one of those episodes which plague mylife. A VIP from North Africa was stranded her just at a time when my appointee was called out oftown on an emergency. I got another of those tales—repetition of Pearl Harbor, etc. which the CIAand so-called Intelligence always pooh-pooh, and mostly they happen. As usual communists andnear-communists can travel under the guise of being representatives of Asian religions. And so longas we continue to study “Asia Culture” under Europeans and students of Europeans this can continuewith ease. The pattern has not changed excepting that there are now three or four distinct socialrevolutions. I can give yon all details.I told him that I was not a social scientist but said: “What are you going to do when the agriculturalprogram which has been established in all your socialist nations tries and fails? It has failedevery time, it is failing now. You are in California and you can learn more from California than fromthe whole rest of the world. The very agriculture that would succeed in your country is just thatwhich has succeeded here. For instance the Date industry. Or what Holy Qur’an says but none ofyou Muslims practice: ‘By the Fig and by the Olive.’ That is the Scripture, but you don’t practice it.You go off and are planning to try what has failed every time.” He had no answer, but believe me,this North Africa thing is not what the papers say, and as we know nothing of the real Islam anymore than we know of Vietnamese “Buddhism,” one has to go off in another direction.The American Friends of the Middle East met here recently. I had already submitted twopapers, one on California Agriculture and how it was a model to the Islamic world, and the otheron real experts here in California who are languishing when they would be helping the world—thescientists and the sociologists don’t see eye-to-eye. Well all the speakers at their gatherings cameup with that it was time to stop speaking and get down to action. And to my amazement—there isalways a first time—the Vice-President brought me out and asked what I was going about DesertAgriculture.It just happens I have been doing all one man alone can do who has, also other interests and norecognition. But by now the whole board of directors of the ASE is interested. So I proposed a jointventure between them and Ford (preferably) or Rockefeller, hiring the real soil experts from Californiaand operating in the lands within their operations (Pakistan to Morocco inclusive).