I’m here by myself all day and then most of the evening. Then it’s used by a group of Sufis who are of the mystical branch of the Moslem Faith and they’re my friends. They come in every evening about five and leave between eight-thirty and nine-thirty. What they do here is pray in the Moslem style with bowing to Mecca. Then they chant chapters from the Koran and then they chant all together the Name of God: “Allah, Allah, Allah…”
They chant this over and over for about half an hour and get very “high” doing this and I look around and join them, of course, because I figure that is part of the trip, to observe what’s happening and generally see if I can get off like they do. I really can’t, it’s so alien to me. It’s just curiosity rather than a deeply religious experience, but it has opened my eyes to the way these Moslems think a little bit.
Of course, their minds, being conditioned from the time they are children, I’ll never be able to completely understand them and they certainly don’t understand me, but they have been very, very kind to me.
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