Title: The Farm Thief
Artist: Participant G (Girl, aged 11)
Year: 2025
Transcribed story
Title: The Farm Thief
Sofina was one of the most compassionate people on the earth. She was Sufi, but she spent more time religiously wise at home. She was an orphan and she had taken over her father's farm, when he died.
She had no siblings, no help, no family. She was only 17. But she was steadfast in her beliefs. She spent her days tending to the animals, doing chores, and caring for her beloved father's fields. All weekends were dedicated to worship of the Divine Allah. She was often seen by other farmers deep in prayer.
One day, she saw a boy her about her age, picking up the ripe fruit from her father's beloved trees and taking vegetables.
She walked over to him and just said, “Why have you not asked for this?”
He said, “I stole from you, because my father is gravely ill. We are poor and I must steal, so we can eat. He needs it now more than ever.”
Sofina was so compassionate that she said, “I feel sorry for you. Your life seems hard. I understand your pain and suffering. I too have gone through much. Move here and tend to the animals and I will carry on tending to the crops. It is easy for me and we will share your pain. There will be plenty of food and it's honourable work helping to make food for people.”
She did not need to do this, and it would affect her, but she took into consideration how she was stopping others suffering.
He was standing in silence. No one had ever shown him such kindness.
“I'll take that as a yes then. You start on Monday, so you have a week to move in. The house is big enough.” And with that, she just went inside.
Ten years later they got married and were forever happy.
Curatorial Note:
This piece was created by Participant G, a 11-year-old girl based in the UK, during an individual Story Design Workshop conducted as part of the Sufi Storytelling Project at the University of Edinburgh.
The young storyteller described what she wished to narrate:
“OK, basically, it was about how, like, even though he stole the fruit and the vegetables, and those were literally her father's crop… Most people would fly to rage and do something else. But, she didn't. And she literally like, gave him a job and a living.”
Themes:
Environment, Islam, Compassion
Citation:
Participant G. (2025) The Farm Thief. In: Digital Museum of Sufi Stories and Art by Children and Families (curated by H.E. Üzümcü). University of Edinburgh. DataShare Repository. https://doi.org/10.7488/ds/8178
Copyright Statement:
© 2025 Participant G. This work is published in anonymised form with the consent of the participant and her caregiver as part of the Digital Museum of Sufi Stories and Art by Children and Families, University of Edinburgh. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) licence. You may share and adapt this work for non-commercial purposes, provided appropriate attribution is given.
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