【推荐1】My sister Electra was leaving a small shop. She was pushing a shopping cart (手推车) and trying to put the change into her pocket at the same time. While she was doing this, she dropped a quarter (二十五分硬币). Carefully she bent over to pick it up. To her surprise, an old man walked towards her. With a quarter in his hand, he said, “Here’s the quarter you dropped, young lady.”

My sister replied, “Oh, I’ve found mine. That must be yours.”

“No, I think it’s yours. I found it on the ground back there,” he said. “It’s not mine. Why don’t you keep it? I have plenty at home. I collect quarters.”

“Really?” my sister asked. “What are you going to do with them?”

“I have over 9,000 quarters. I have always dreamed of driving across the country through the northern states and then down to California and back to New York, but now I’m too old to do that. so I think I’ll buy a TV.” he explained to her.

“Oh.” my sister said. “Don’t give up your dream of traveling. I know someone who took the train and had a lovely trip. Why don’t you try that?”

“Why did I never think of that?” the old man said, sounding hopeful of this new idea. “I think about and look into it. Thank you for telling me.”

My sister told me the story and said, “I just don’t want to see him giving up his dream and buying a TV! I’m glad I dropped that quarter. Perhaps what I said will change his life.”

【推荐2】I was doing the work in the garden yesterday. It was a soft evening and I was making the most of it when I heard a neighbor’s voice coming from the path out of our garden.

“That’s no place to be sleeping!” he said.

I found there was a man lying on his back on the path with his eyes closed. I recognized him. I had seen him doing the drunkard’s (酒鬼) walk along that path several times.

I stopped to walk out. “Do you need some help?” I asked.

He opened his eyes and said, “Probably.” Then he told me because of arthritis (关节炎) he couldn’t walk well at the most of times. I thought I should do it when he asked to help him go home where he lived a few hundred metres away.

I tried to let him walk under his own strength with me guiding him but that was getting us nowhere. It was easier to carry him, but that would be a real insult (侮辱) to him. So, I held his left hand with my left hand and grabbed his belt with my right hand. Then we started walking slowly.

On the way he told me his name, what he had worked as, what holidays he had been, how wonderful his granddaughter was, what his wife’s name was — and what a hard time she would give him when he got home!

Thank goodness! His wife wasn’t in when we walked forty-five minutes back to his home.

If we wait until we feel good about helping before we help, then people will go unhelped and we will become the ones who end up walking on by.

Emil was a young schoolboy from a small town in Germany. One day, his mother gave him some money and asked him to fly to Berlin to see his grandmother. In order to save more money, Emil took a bus to the railway station. He was very careful not to lose the money and used a needle (针) to pin it to the inside of his jacket.

On the train to Berlin, Emil met a man called Grundeis. He was so hospitable that he offered Emil some chocolate. Emil fell asleep after eating it. When he woke up, Grundeis was gone, and so was the money! Emil got off immediately at an unfamiliar station, looking for Grundeis.

When Emil saw Grundeis in the crowd, he followed him. However, he was unable to catch him. A local boy named Gustav helped him. He gathered 24 local children who called themselves “detectives” and asked them to follow the thief.

Emil and the “detectives” followed Grundies to a hotel and kept watch on him all night. When morning came, they saw him go to a bank where he wanted to exchange the money for smaller bills. One of the boy “detectives” followed him into the bank and told the bank teller (柜员) that the money was stolen from someone else. Emil came in, too. He told the bank teller his story and proved that the money was his by describing the holes in the bills left by the needle.

Grundeis tried to run away, but Emil and his new friends held on tightly to him until a policeman arrived and caught him. Emil finally got his money back and could continue on to his grandmother’s home.