Thursday, December 23, 2010
Once again, I promised somebody I'll do a post before I go on cruise, and so, here it is.
The only problem is that I have no idea what to write about. So, yeah. I was looking for inspirational stories for my Welcome Week booklet, and stumbled upon this story. And I felt that it was really meaningful, so I'm going to share it here.
One day, the father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the express purpose of showing him how poor people live.
They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.
On their return from their trip, the father asked his son, “How was the trip?”
“It was great, Dad.”
“Did you see how poor people live?” the father asked.
“Oh yeah,” said the son.
“So, tell me, what did you learn from the trip?” asked the father.
The son answered: “I saw that we have one dog and they had four. We have a pool that reaches to the middle of our garden and they have a creek that has no end. We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night. Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.
“We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight.
“We have servants who serve us, but they serve others. We buy our food, but they grow theirs.
“We have walls around our property to protect us, they have friends to protect them.”
The boy’s father was speechless.
Then his son added, “Thanks Dad for showing me how poor we are.”
I think this ties in very well with the lessons learnt in NLLC. And this also teaches us to cherish whatever we have, from the necessities in life, like food, to things we may often overlook when it is in abundance, but notice its absence when it is gone. Something like friendship.
So this Christmas, cherish the things that you have, the food you eat, the water you drink and the company of friends, for there are those out there who have none of this.
I just realise this is such a sad post. But oh well. MERRY CHRISTMAS!!
Thursday, December 23
~Ivor~