June 1, 2010
Dear Editor,
I really enjoyed your recent “Pick”. The story of perfect strangers coming to your aide via “unsolicited advise” truly rings the bell with me. I have experienced a similar attitude amongst people in Poland where I have visited some years ago during the huge inflation and general hardship in the country. I was not familiar with the prices and the currency, which was printed in enormous denominations of thousands and tens of thousands. Somehow I seemed to always try to pay 20 000 zlotys for a newspaper and so on. I was invariably corrected and gently reprimanded by the vendors who returned my “ big” bills and requested smaller payments. I feel that it is the people who experience some kind of a challenge or a struggle themselves, who are most likely to look out for a total stranger among them.
Margaret Kellermann Mcculloch