Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Welcome to The Moth. I'm Cleves Natera. I'm a Moth storyteller, I'm a teacher, and most importantly for this episode, I'm a writer. This week is Banned Books Week, and to honor that, we'll be sharing stories about censorship, courage, and the importance of the written word. I'll talk a bit more about why this week is so critical later in the episode, but let's start with a story.
Mohammed bin Kulayf told us at a Houston story slam where the theme of the night was, appropriately enough, books. Here's Mohammed live at the Moth.
I wonder how many of you had to meet strangers in parking lot to buy books. Otherwise, you probably never lived in a third-world country where censorship impacts your buying purchases. In Saudi Arabia, where I grew up, the government censored books, where there are certain books you're allowed to buy and there are certain books that they're just not allowed.
Any books that explicitly argues with evolution or against the governments or against religion, they will be straight-up banned. So, I don't know if you all remember message boards and internet forum.
Chapter 2: What is the significance of Banned Books Week?
That's when I would go and know about what books are banned and what like hot so I could go and chase down for those books because I'm not buying available books. I'm buying all the banned ones that the government told me I should not read. But the problem is there's a lot of books that are not available that we assume they're banned.
So when we want to buy banned books, we would hear of a friend of a friend or a cousin or someone off the online or going to a neighboring country. So we would send them a list. We would be like, this is the books that we're looking for. Michael Jackson cassettes, the Titanic. And we would meet in a parking lot. And we either give them money or we exchange with other banned books and other...
cassettes. If you travel to a neighboring country in Saudi Arabia, bookstores would have literally a section of banned books in Saudi Arabia because they know we would spend any money to get a banned book. There is a trick or a loophole in the system where we could get our hands on banned books.
That's Riyadh International Book Fair, and I recommend you check out their Wikipedia page because there is a lot of scandals throughout the years. because there's a lot of books that come to Saudi at one time and a lot of them are new that Saudi government did not have chance to review, there would be a chance of getting banned books.
The agency that enforces banned books are religious police and they will walk into the book fair chasing down people buying books and they will take them off of their hand and they will be at the gates looking at what you bought and they will check out the books and they will read it and they'll be like, oh, there are animals talking in these books.
And the other person will be like, yeah, that sounds quite socialist. And I'll be like, it's the animal farms. That's for kids. Why would you take that away from me? I've always wanted to read Dostoevsky, and I could not find any of his works, so I assumed they were banned. On the internet, there's always mention of a very specific translation.
His name is Sami al-Dhruby, and he is a very popular Syrian translator. He is the authority of Russian literature. And if you wanted to read just USQ, you want to read his books. And they were the ones that were the most wanted in my list. And every year at the book fair, I would ask for them.
One year, I went on a Wednesday morning, the men's only day, and I walked in early in the morning before the religious police could come in, and I went to the publisher, and I shouted him up.
He was getting set up, drinking his cardamom tea, and I start to get to know him, and I start complaining about censorship and all the politics and whatnot, and I told him how I've always wanted Dusty Vilsky's books, and he's like, okay, I got you. I have them. I was like, you have Dostoevsky's? I've always wanted them. How much?
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Chapter 3: How does censorship affect book availability in Saudi Arabia?
That's gonna be my entry. I was like, sure, whatever, I will meet you tomorrow. I brought money, and he opened the fan, and oh my God, there were all those knuckle edges all over his fan. It was amazing. And he opened the box, said, I see all the work. Oh, great. 18 volume, black and gold. It was so old. Yellow pages. They were so dusty and smelly. It smells so good.
It smells like spiders been having sex all over them. It's so amazing. I don't know if you know that smell. That is so good. It's such a good smell. And I was like, yes, I got the box. I go home. I didn't even open it. And he told me to promise him not to post it on the internet because he does not want to get in trouble.
And I was like, sure, I will wait until the end because there is a thread on the internet where we post about our hauls. And usually it's a picture of banned books. So I waited. A few days later, I go in, and I wanted to see what everyone has been posting, what they have been reading. And everyone has been posting the same books I just bought $500 for.
Apparently that year it became available, but he took advantage of how much I wanted to get banned books. And I honestly did not want to read them anymore. They're not hot anymore. They were available at the normal bookstores where you buy The Habit Trap and all those normal books. I wanted to get banned books. That's what I always wanted. Thank you so much for listening.
That was Mohammed bin Kulayf. Originally from Riyadh, Mohammed lives in Montrose, where he helps first-time buyers navigate Houston's wild real estate ride. A former bartender and newspaper writer, he loves stories, loud dinners, and the quiet magic of helping people feel like they finally belong.
At The Moth, we think that storytelling is important, that it connects people, that stories should be heard. It's kind of our whole deal. And this Banned Books Week, we hope you'll reflect on how easy it is for stories to be unheard. As a writer myself, I first learned about the power of language as a young child.
I immigrated to the United States at 10 years old, and my father stayed behind in the Dominican Republic. This was back in the late 80s, when no one in my immigrant family had long-distance calling in our Washington Heights neighborhood of New York City. Once a month, my family and I would walk a few blocks to the closest calling center and call my father.
Each of us kids only had a couple of minutes to speak, and I felt this incredible obligation to make those few words count, to help my father, who had never traveled to the United States, understand this new place, see it alongside with me to help me make sense of it. Over the years, I think about those conversations as the first seeds of my passion for storytelling.
Those brief and silly stories I told my dad had the power to collapse the thousands of miles between us, make me feel closer to him, find my way during uncertain times. When I think about the books that have done the same things for me, made me feel closer to fictional characters and their circumstances, helped me to see the world in uncertain terms, many top the list of most banned books.
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Chapter 4: What unique methods do people use to obtain banned books?
If I wanted to be a hero, I decided to go to school and become a school teacher. And like most folks, as soon as I graduated school, there I was running a local restaurant here in town. I enjoyed it. I had regulars who would come see me every day, and I had one regular in particular who showed up one day with a friend.
And she and the friend started speaking to me, and it turns out the friend was a principal at a nearby elementary school. She said, I have a job for you. It's with a first grade class. I said, well, hmm, okay. I did all my training with fourth grade. She said, that's not going to be a problem. All you have to promise me is that you just won't quit. What? And I went and met the class.
And after spending about 10 minutes with these friends, I learned what happened to the first two teachers. Yeah, they were now I would call it challenging. But every day when I walked into that room, I wasn't going to quit. And I thought about what my second grade teacher used to tell us that everybody has something to contribute. And I thought that about my class as well.
They taught me so many things. They taught me to be patient, and they taught me to most of all see the value in every child. And I didn't know it at the time, but they were shaping the type of teacher I would become, but most importantly, the type of parent I would become later on. Fast forward about seven or eight years in time, and I have one, two, three kids now. My two oldest are autistic.
They were diagnosed at an early age. My oldest is nonverbal. My son, my middle child, he's a little more verbal. We weren't planning on having a third. And I asked God, you're giving us a third child. Give me one that can talk, God. And he said, all right, watch this. And we always tell folks she was four going on 40. And I was going to do with them the same thing that my dad did with me.
And I was going to share some of my favorite books with them. So with my son, we got out the Spider-Man comics and he loved Wonder Woman. Hmm. With my youngest, she was a reader. I got out Harry Potter and she loved reading about the Titanic and World War II and nonfiction.
Hmm.
We did find some books that we really enjoyed together. I had heard about a book on Twitter where I talked to a bunch of my teacher friends and it was called I Need a New Butt by Don McMillan. It was a picture book for kids and I found a copy at the local Walmart and I read it to my kids and they loved it. Every second of it. I Need a New Butt followed by I Broke My Butt.
My butt is noisy, yes, my personal favorite. And most recently we were at the Walmart and we found a copy of My Butt is So Silly and we all kind of clamored over who was gonna get to grab it off the shelf and read it first. And we got in the car and we read it on the way home and we laughed and we giggled because kids need those silly books, those funny books.
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Chapter 5: What challenges does Mohammed face when buying banned books?
And then I was called to the principal's office. Even when you're a grown up, that's no fun getting called to the principal's office. And my principal, she told me, Mr. Price. We have to talk about that book that you read today. I don't know if it was the most appropriate book. Some parents may complain. And I said, well, that's not a problem. I'm so sorry.
If someone complains, I'm more than happy to talk to them and apologize. And she said, OK, OK, we'll have to talk about it some more later. So, yes, ma'am. I left her office and about 15 minutes later, I got called back to her office because the superintendent wanted to see me at the district office.
And I drove to the district office on the other side of town and walked into the building in the conference room with the superintendent and assistant superintendent and y'all they let me have it because I chose this book. That day they sent me home, suspended with pay, pending investigation because parents are gonna call. Two days later, they call me back out to the district office.
Y'all, and I was a nervous wreck anyways, because just talking about it, I've never been in trouble like that before with these folks ever. They called me back to the district office, and they came to a decision and said, Mr. Price, we just can't get past this. I just can't get past why you chose to read this book.
It was poor professional judgment, and because of which, we're terminating your contract effective immediately. And I froze. I'm a dad of kids with autism. We don't sleep at night. We just worry with our eyes closed on a normal day. How am I going to pay for therapy, medicine, bills, luxuries like food, lights, and water?
They told me, you could sign this resignation and we can part ways, or you go home and think about it and decide if you want to appeal this, you'll have to find an attorney and we can start an appeal process. And they left me in the room. And I called my wife. I told my wife what had happened. And she said, we've been married 21 years. If you were wrong, I would tell you you were wrong.
But you weren't wrong. So you're not signing that resignation. Thank you. She said, pick your head up high, don't let them see you cry, and walk right out of that building and come home. And I did just that. I picked my head up high, didn't let them see me cry, and drove right down the street to the Dollar General for a box of Little Debbie Zebra Cakes. It's true.
If you're going to eat your emotions, there's no better way than Little Debbie Zebra Cakes. Well, after that, my wife and I found an attorney, and we began the appeal process. Y'all, I've never been in trouble before, so this was all new territory for me. But day one of the appeal went a little bit like this.
We had an expert witness come to say that reading kids' silly books is good pedagogy or teaching. They objected. We have evidence of other books, objection. We have affidavits from other educators, objection. See a pattern?
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