I am ever on the lookout for books which cheer, rather than depress. They seem harder and harder to find nowadays. Then I came upon The Kindness of Strangers with a quaint cover disguised as a well worn leatherbound book.
The Dalai Lama has written the preface. “ I greatly appreciate the theme of this book that gathers stories of kindness received when it was most needed … I am sure they will inspire everyone to take whatever opportunities arise to be kind to others in turn.”
Don George has spent twenty-five years wandering the world and has brought together tales from some of his favorite writers to tell of their own examples of unexpected kindness.
Jan Morris writes of being nursed back to health by a Sherpa family in their smoky hut in Nepal. “I didn’t even know the local words for thank you.”
Pico Iyer writes about being shown the sights of Mandalay by Maung-Maung who had a B.S. in Mathematics but drove a tri-shaw, and was saving his money to get a further certification in Mathmatics.
James Houston,locked his keys in his rental car. Lost on a dark night on the island of Hilo in Hawaii he finds himself face to with a large fierce looking man who straightens a coat hanger that he slips down the car window and unlocks it. “Hey one time maybe I get stuck, you come by, do da same. Everything come round, you know.”
I kept wondering as I read, how these travellers got themselves in their predicaments – wandering away from her group, lost in the Sahara Desert as Amanda Jones was, for Heaven’s sake !
But read on, Gentle Reader. These are tales we need to know about.
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