
“The hungrier one becomes, the clearer one’s mind works.”
Tarkad had not tasted food for two whole days. He ran into someone he would have preferred to
avoid – the Camel Trader called Dabasir. Tarkad owed Dabasir copper and silver pieces.
“Ill fortune pursues every man who thinks more of borrowing than of repaying.” said the large
Dabasir as he sat eating in front of the famished Tarkad.
“I did hear of a traveler just returned from Urfa of certain rich man who has a piece of stone so
thin you can see through it.” “Tarkad? Thinkest all the world could look to a man a different color
from what it is? Asked Dabasir.
Dabasir, wanting to teach Tarkad a lesson or two began to tell him and the onlookers in the
restaurant how he came to be a Camel Trader after being a slave in Syria.
Dabasir borrowed from his friends and could not repay them. Things went from bad to worse. His
wife returned to her father and he left Babylon. He fell in with robbers and were taken to
Damascus and sold as slaves. Dabasir was purchased for two silver pieces by a Syrian desert chief
and became a camel tender for his daughter who is intrigued with Dabasir’s background.
“If a man has within him the soul of a free man, will he not become respected and honored in his
own city in spite of his misfortune?” “Have you a desire to repay the just debts you owe in
Babylon? She parried.
“Yes I have the desire, but see no way.” Said Dabasir.
“…thou hast but the contemptible soul of a slave. No man is otherwise who cannot respect
himself and no man can respect himself who does not repay honest debts.”
Dabasir’s debts were his enemy and he had been run out of town. If he had stood up and fought
like a man, he would have found respect.
“If I had the soul of a free man, I would force my way back into Babylon, repay the people who
had trusted me, bring happiness to my wife who truly loved me and bring peace and contentment
to me parents.”

