Once there was a king. He had two old ministers. One was kind and the other was bad. The bad minister often said bad words about the kind minister before the king. The king was very angry.

One day the king said to the bad minister , “Write two words on two pieces of paper. Write ‘live’ on one piece and ‘die’ on the other . Then put them in a jar and tell him to choose. If he takes out the paper with ‘live’ on it , I will let him go. If he takes out the paper with ‘die’ on it ,I will kill him at once.”

The bad minister was quite happy. He got two pieces of paper ready. He wrote “die” on each piece of paper.

The kind old man came. He knew the bad minister wanted to kill him. He also knew the words on the two pieces both “die”, but he knew what to do. Later the king had to keep his word and let the old minister go. Do you know what the kind man do about this at that time?

Christopher Thomas, 27, was a writer by night and a teacher by day when he noticed he was always tired and was losing weight fast．Diagnosed with diabetes（糖尿病）, Thomas would need to inject himself with insulin（胰岛素） three times a day for the rest of his life or risk nerve damage, blindness, and even death．And if that weren't bad enough, he had no health insurance．

      After a month of feeling upset, Thomas decided he'd better find a way to fight back．He left Canton, Michigan for New York, got a job waiting tables, nicknamed himself the Diabetic Rockstar , and created diabeticrockstar.com, a free online community for diabetics and their loved ones—a place where over 1,100 people share personal stories, information, and resources．

      Jason Swencki’s son, Kody, was diagnosed with type diabetes at six．Father and son visit the online children's forums（论坛） together most evenings．"Kody gets so excited, writing to kids from all over," says Swencki, one of the site's volunteers．"They know what he's going through, so he doesn't feel alone．"

      Kody is anything but alone: Diabetes is now the seventh leading cause of death in the United States, with 24 million diagnosed cases．And more people are being diagnosed at younger ages．

These days, Thomas's main focus is his charity（慈善机构）, Fight It, which provides medicines and supplies to people—225 to date—who can't afford a diabetic's huge expenses. Fight-it.org has raised about $23,000—in products and in cash．In May, Thomas will hold the first annual Diabetic Rockstar Festival in the Caribbean．

Even with a staff of 22 volunteers, Thomas often devotes up to 50 hours a week to his cause, while still doing his full-time job waiting tables．"Of the diabetes charities out there, most are putting money into finding a cure," says Bentley Gubar, one of Rockstar's original members．"But Christopher is the only person I know saying people need help now．"

 It was something she had dreamed of since she was five. Finally, after years of training and hard work, Deborah Duffey was going to play in her first high school basketball game. The goals of becoming an outstanding player and playing for a college were never far from Deborah's mind.

   The game was against Mills High School. With 1:42 minutes left in the game, Deborah's team led by one point. A player of Mills had the ball, and Deborah ran to guard against her. As Deborah ran to stop the player, her knee went out and she fell on the court (球场) in great pain. Just like that, Deborah's season was over.

   After suffering the bad injury, Deborah found that, for the first time in her lift, she was in a situation beyond her control. Game after game, she could do nothing but sit outside watching others play the game that she loved so much.

   Injuries limited Deborah's time on the court as she hurt her knees three more times in the next five years. She had to spend hours in a physical therapy clinic (物理治疗诊所) to receive treatment. Her frequent visits there gave her a passion and respect for the job. And Deborah began to see a new light in her life.

   Currently a senior in college, Deborah focuses on working on a degree in physical therapy. After she graduates, Deborah plans to use her knowledge to educate people how to best take care of their bodies and deal with the feelings of hopelessness that she remembers so well.

I was born in the city of York, in England, in 1632. My father was a man of some wealth, able to give me a good home and send me to school. It was his wish that I should be a lawyer but my head began to be filled very early with thoughts of travel, and I would be satisfied with nothing but going to sea. One day, being at Hull, I met one of my friends who was about to sail for London in his father's ship, and he invited me to go with him. Without telling my father, I went on board.

   On the way to London, our ship was destroyed by a storm, and we almost lost our lives. I went on foot to London, where I met with the master of a large ship which did business with countries on the coast of Africa. He offered me a chance to go with him, which I gladly accepted.

   A great storm came up, and the ship was tossed (颠簸) about for many days, until we did not know where we were. Suddenly we hit a bank of sand, and the sea broke over the ship in such a way that we could not hope to have her hold many moments without breaking into pieces. So we used a boat instead. After we had been driven four or five miles, a mountainous wave hit us so hard that it overturned the boat at once. I swam well but the waves were so strong that I was pushed against a rock with such force, and left unconscious. But I recovered a little before the waves returned, and, running forward, got to the mainland safely. I never regretted my decisions.

While driving home after work, Jane Hodgson noticed a car pulled over at the side of the road and a crowd beginning to gather around someone who was lying on the ground.

Jane, who had completed a first aid at work course, pulled over to see if she could offer any help — and it turned out to be lucky for the young injured girl that she did.

Describing the scene she came across, Jane says: “The onlookers were ashen-faced and looking lost. They were so shocked that they hadn’t even thought to call for an ambulance yet.”

After speaking to the emergency services, Jane started finding out what had happened and what injuries the young girl called Jenny had. The girl had been hit by a car and gone over the handlebars of her bike, landing on her head and shoulder. Her shoulder and arm were twisted (扭曲) underneath her.

“She hadn’t been wearing a helmet (头盔) when she got knocked down, and I thought that she should not be moved as I couldn’t be sure about a spinal injury (脊椎损伤), but after looking her over and checking the circulation in her injured arm I did feel fairly confident that she had escaped relatively unhurt.

“As we were waiting for an ambulance, the amount of pain the girl was in was increasing. To distract (分散注意力) her and minimize the risk of her going into shock I kept her talking. She held my hand tightly when the pain got too much and this helped. I told her I could handle it — we laughed about that,” describes Jane.

Later, a doctor from the local hospital’s ICU stopped at the scene too. The ICU doctor decided that Jenny should lie on her back, making her much more comfortable until the emergency services arrived.

Thinking back, Jane says: “For me, knowing that in a small way I helped that girl through what was a frightening experience is all the reward I need. I felt great to know I’d made a difference and I’d do it again.”

 When her five daughters were young, Helene An always told them that there was strength in unity (团结). To show this, she held up one chopstick, representing one person. Then she easily broke it into two pieces. Next, she tied several chopsticks together, representing a family. She showed the girls it was hard to break the tied chopsticks. This lesson about family unity stayed with the daughters as they grew up.

Helene An and her family own a large restaurant business in California. However, when Helene and her husband Danny left their home in Vietnam in 1975, they didn't have much money. They moved their family to San Francisco. There they joined Danny's mother, Diana, who owned a small Italian sandwich shop. Soon afterwards, Helene and Diana changed the sandwich shop into a small Vietnamese restaurant. The five daughters helped in the restaurant when they were young. However, Helene did not want her daughters to always work in the family business because she thought it was too hard.

Eventually the girls all graduated from college and went away to work for themselves, but one by one, the daughters returned to work in the family business. They opened new restaurants inSan Franciscoand Los Angeles. Even though family members sometimes disagreed with each other, they worked together to make the business successful. Daughter Elisabeth explains, "Our mother taught us that to succeed we must have unity, and to have unity we must have peace. Without the strength of the family, there is no business."

Their expanding business became a large corporation in 1996, with three generations of Ans working together. Now the Ans' corporation makes more than $20 million each year. Although they began with a small restaurant, they had big dreams, and they worked together. Now they are a big success.

Last week when I was sitting in my office，I heard an elderly lady talking on the phone about her husband．Her husband’s name was Ed．He dropped her off for her doctor’s appointment and was going to park the car and wait for her．She was so upset that she started to cry．I knew I should take action．

The lady told me her name was Helen and she called the restaurant she and her husband were going to have lunch at after her appointment to see if he was waiting for her there．She explained that she thought her husband parked the car in the parking lot and waited for her in the car but she didn’t find him there so she returned to see if he entered the medical building，but Ed was not there either．She regretted making her husband park the car alone since some signs of Alzheimer’s(早老年性痴呆病)had happened in his behavior．I asked a few nurses to help look for Ed inside and outside the medical building according to Helen’s description．Then I offered to drive Helen to the restaurant to see if Ed was waiting for her there．

On arriving at the parking lot of the restaurant，Helen began to search for Ed’s car but she failed，which suggested Ed wasn’t there．We decided to have a talk with the manager before we returned to the hospital．On our way to the manager’s office．I received a call from a nurse，who said they had found Ed．What a relief! But we still needed to go on searching since he forgot where he parked his car! Fortunately, we didn’t have much difficulty finding it．

As I waved good-bye to the couple, I thought “This is true love in life．The love is not romantic but it stays with us all the time．’’

 I'm Andrei, a shy kid, scared of people. When I was 13, I decided to enter an arts school. There, I met this 56-year-old teacher Peter who greeted me in a strange way when I went into his workshop.

   "Hi!" I said with half a voice. "I want to sign up for your classes. I like boats and planes and I want to control them with the remote control."

   He raised his chin up and was analyzing me. "So you can come, mess up my shop and then quit in two weeks?" he asked.

   Apparently not a lot of people like him. Also kids could hardly focus on mastering a proper craft that takes detail and patience. But eventually I convinced him to take me in with all his doubts.

   I started the next day. I worked side by side with him. He made me do useless things instead of showing me how to create model replicas (复制品). But I stayed. I saw other kids coming and going, some only coming once per week and then quitting after a few weeks. The old teachers was more like a lifeguard making sure kids do not hurt themselves by swallowing nails or cutting their fingers off. And indeed, they also made a mess with the glue and everything. I was also face-pafining (捂脸) myself a lot seeing how my group was behaving sometimes.

   The fact is the old man was not that bad. He started opening up and I grew to admire him. He was teaching me his life's work. We went on competitions and won prizes with models we built. For me, I've found a good teacher, and for him he found his prize student.

In 1943,when I was 4,my parents moved from Coeur d’Alene ,Idaho ,to Fairbanks,Alaska,where adventure was never very far away.

We arrived in the summer,just in time to enjoy the midnight sun.All that sunlight was fantastic for Mum’s vegetable garden.Working in the garden at Midnight tended to throw her timing off, so she didn’t care much about my bedtime.

Dad was a Railway Express agent and Mum was his clerk. That left me in a mess. I usually managed to find some trouble to get into. Once I had a little fire going in the dirty basement of a hotel. I had tried to light a barrel(桶) of a paint but couldn’t really get a good fire going. The smoke got pretty bad, though, and when I made my exit, a crowd and the police were there to greet me. The policemen took my matches and drove me home.

Mum and Dad were occupied in the garden and Dad told the police to keep me, and they did! I had a tour of the prison before Mum rescued me. I hadn’t turned 5 yet.

As I entered kindergarten, the serious cold began to set in. Would it surprise you to know that I soon left part of my tongue on a metal handrail at school?

As for Leonhard Seppala, famous as a dog sledder(驾雪橇者), I think I knew him well because I was taken for a superstar he was, but I do remember the ride well. I was wrapped heavily and well sheltered from the freezing and blowing weather.

In 1950, we moved back to Coeur d’Alene, but we got one more Alaskan adventure when Leonhard invited us eight years later by paying a visit to Idaho to attend a gathering of former neighbours of Alaska.

Hetty Robinson learnt all about money when very young. As a child, she read the financial (金融的) pages of the newspaper to her rich father. Her father died when Hetty was 30, and she inherited $1 million. When she herself died in 1916, she left almost $100 million to her two children. 

Hetty made her money on the New York stock (股票) exchange. She was a financial genius. She made money so easily that people called her the Witch of Wall Street. But although she was one of the richest women in the world, she counted every cent and spent as little as possible. She didn’t own a house, because she didn’t want to pay taxes. So she and her children lived in cheap hotels. She spent almost nothing on clothes, and always wore the same long black dress. She washed it herself, but to save soap she only washed the bottom of the dress, where it touched the ground. Other people had their own offices, but Hetty used a desk in the bank where she kept her money, because it didn’t cost anything. She sat in the bank and ate her sandwiches while she bought and sold stocks and shares. If the bank complained, she just moved all her money to another bank. 

Hetty’s family paid the price for her meanness. When she was 33 she married a millionaire, Edward Green, and they had two children. But Green lost all his money, so she left him. When her son, Ned, injured his knee, Hetty didn’t want to pay for a doctor, so she took him to a free hospital for poor people. Unfortunately the doctor knew Hetty was rich and he asked for money. Hetty refused and took the boy away. His leg got worse and two years later doctors removed it. 

But eventually Ned got his revenge (报应). At the age of 81, Hetty had an argument with a shop assistant about the price of a bottle of milk. She became so angry that she had a heart attack and died. So Hetty’s meanness finally killed her. Ned inherited half his mother’s fortune, and he spent it all on parties, holidays and expensive jewellery.