Chinese Version
01-10-2019
In early January 2019, I flew from the sunny California to very cold Massachusetts. Walking outside on a sunny day in Massachusetts, I felt the cold wind stabbing my face like many small needles which was very painful. I didn’t like to go out for a walk even during the day, and I didn’t think I would walk in the cold night of Massachusetts to ask for help. This is an airport story about different styles.
I drove my daughter to Boston airport to pick up her friend Shirah. Before leaving home, my daughter searched online in advance and learned that it would take about 30 minutes for international passengers arriving at Boston airport to pass through the customs.
When we arrived at the airport at 6:50pm, we saw Shirah’s flight had landed at 6:30pm. Thinking we could pick her up within 20 minutes, my daughter went in the arrivals hall to see Shirah and I sat in my car along the side of the street, waiting for them to come back soon.
There were two rows of cars, in total more than two dozen, waiting along the side of the street at the Boston airport, as some cars picked up their passengers and left, I moved a few feet and stopped for a while, then moved a few feet and stopped for a while again. I didn’t expect that my daughter and Shirah would come back only after more than an hour. I also didn’t expect that our car would not start after moving slowly for more than an hour, because the battery was dead.
I had to get out of the car, walk in the cold night, knock on the window of the cars waiting along the side of the street one by one asking for help. Seeing me approaching, the majority of the drivers in the cars shook their hands and refused to talk to me, only very few drivers rolled down their windows on a cold night for me. I told them: “The battery of my car is dead. Do you have a cable? Can you help to jump start my car?”
I passed by more than ten cars without engaging in conversation, asked a few drivers and got the help from two kind middle-aged ladies.
At this time, my daughter and Shirah came back. The kind ladies helped us jump start my car on a cold night, then my daughter got into the driver’s seat to start the engine. I learned to wait for the engine to run for one minute before disconnecting the jump cable.
On the way home, Shirah apologized for her delay in passing the Customs: “Because the government is shutting down, there are very few customs security agents and I had to wait in a very long line to pass the customs.”
The shutdown of the government impacted ordinary people like me in such unexpected way, which made me see the beauty of mankind and my own personal resilience that I don’t usually feel.
After that, we bought a charging line and a charging battery, just in case. We hope we are able to help others in the future.
In 2021, we did use our battery to help Rachel.