- My husband and I and my younger brother and his wife were in the small town of Vaga, Norway when the Sept 11 attack took place. We saw the terror on Norwegian television, interpreted by our restaurant host. It was a strange experience to be far from home, to have the majority of our news in a language we were not totally familiar with, and except for our small group of four, to be among relative strangers. Yet, the kindness these strangers showed us throughout our trip were unforgettable.

The host who told us about the attack, refused to take a tip, asking only for our hands in
friendship People who heard us speak English in Oslo, Stockholm and Copenhagen, walked
up to us spontaneously to tell us how sorry they were for us and for America. The cab driver
who drove us to the airport for departure on Sept 17 refused to take the fare. He said that
this was his "gift to us."

As we begin to recover, with increased attentiveness to the new world we are living in, at
the forefront of my mind will be the kindness we were shown when we were far from
home. (Rosemary Lehman)

In "A Time For Gifts", Stephen Jay Gould, a professor of zoology at Harvard, and author
of "Questioning the Millennium," conveyed a similar perspective. Gould says, "The patterns
of human history mix decency and depravity in equal measure. We often assume, therefore,
that such a fine balance of results must emerge from societies made of decent and depraved
people in equal numbers. But we need to expose and celebrate the fallacy of this conclusion
so that, in this moment of crisis, we may reaffirm an essential truth too easily forgotten, and
regain some crucial comfort too readily forgone. Good and kind people outnumber all
others by thousands to one. The tragedy of human history lies in the enormous potential
for destruction in rare acts of evil, not in the high frequency of evil people. Complex
systems can only be built step by step, whereas destruction requires but an instant. Thus,
in what I like to call the Great Asymmetry, every spectacular incident of evil will be
balanced by 10,000 acts of kindness, too often unnoted and invisible as the 'ordinary'
efforts of a vast majority." I would like to note and make visible the acts of kindness we
were shown and encourage you to read Gould's entire article at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/26/opinion/26GOUL.html?