助人乃快乐之本 Thu.Nov.9 2006 早上在公车上给个老奶奶让座了,其实之前也犹豫过会不会冒昧,但看她腿脚不 是很方便的样子,所以就小心翼翼问了句:“Need a seat?”她很开心地就接受了。 “I really appreciate it. ”大概听到了这么句话吧!下车前,她再次笑着向我致 谢。 在让座的时候,很自然就想起之前看过的一篇文章,作者在给人让座之后说,希 望在世界的另一个地方,也有人会为我的奶奶让座。这样算是因果循环,行德积善吧! 下午去学院的时候,看到门口放着一小盒小红花,这两天在街上在学校也看到不 少人衣襟上都别着,于是问服务台的工作人员那是做什么的。大致就是给二战老兵所 做的一种慈善基金吧!于是把身上的零钱都投进了捐款箱,取走一朵小红花。那花, 是纸做的罂粟。来由含义就看英文版吧! History of the Poppy Appeal The first official Legion Poppy Day was held in Britain on 11 November 1921, inspired by the poem In Flanders' Fields written by John McCrae. Since then the Poppy Appeal has been a key annual event in the nation's calendar. How the Poppy Appeal began Some of the bloodiest fighting of World War One took place in the Flanders and Picardy regions of Belgium and Northern France. The poppy was the only thing which grew in the aftermath of the complete devastation. McCrae, a doctor serving there with the Canadian Armed Forces, deeply inspired and moved by what he saw, wrote these verses: In Flanders' Fields John McCrae, 1915 In Flanders' fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place: and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders' fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe; To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high, If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders' Fields. On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918, the First World War ended. Civilians wanted to remember the people who had given their lives for peace and freedom. An American War Secretary, Moina Michael, inspired by John McCrae's poem, began selling poppies to friends to raise money for the ex-Service community. And so the tradition began. The Poppy Factory In 1922, Major George Howson, a young infantry officer, formed the Disabled Society, to help disabled ex-Service men and women from the First World War. Howson suggested to the Legion that members of the Disabled Society could make poppies and the Poppy Factory was subsequently founded in Richmond in 1922. The original poppy was designed so that workers with a disability could easily assemble it and this principle remains today.