Welcome to Stoyline Online. Brought to you by the SAG-AFTRA Foundation.
I'm Ed O'Neill and today I'll be reading How I Learned Geography written and illustrated
by Uri Shulevitz.
When war devastated the land,
buildings crumbled to dust.
Everything we had was lost, and we fled empty-handed. We traveled far, far east to another country,
where summer were hot and winters were cold, to a city of houses made of clay, straw, and camel dung,
surrounded by dusty steppes, burned by the sun.
We lived in a small room with a couple we did not know.
We slept on a dirt floor.
I had no toys and no books.
Worst of all: food was scarce.
One day, Father went to the bazaar to buy bread.
As evening approached, he hadn't returned.
Mother and I were worried and hungry.
It was nearly dark when he came home.
He carried a long roll of paper under his arm.
"I bought a map," he announced triumphantly.
"Where is the bread?"
Mother asked.
"I had enough money to buy only a tiny piece of bread, and we would still be hungry,"
he explained apologetically.
"No supper tonight," Mother said bitterly.
"We'll have the map instead."
I was furious.
I didn't think I would ever forgive him, and I went to bed hungry, while the couple we
lived with ate their meager supper.
The husband was a writer.
He write in silence, but, oh!
how loudly he chewed.
He chewed a small crust of bread as if it were the most delicious morsel in the world.
I envied him his bread and wished I were the one chew it.
I covered my head with my blanket so I would not hear him smacking his lips with such noisy delight.
The next day father hung the map.
It took up an entire wall.
Our cheerless room was flooded with color.
I became fascinated by the map and spent long hours looking at it, studying its every detail,
and many days drawing it on any scrap of paper that chanced my way.
I found strange-sounding names on the map and savored their exotic sounds,
making a little rhyme out of them: Fukuoka Takaoka omsk, Fukuyama Nagayama Tomsk, Okazaki Miyazaki
Pinks, Pennsylvania Transylvania Minsk!
I repeated this rhyme like a magic incantation and was transported far away
without ever leaving our room.
I landed in burning deserts.
I ran on beaches and felt their sand between my toes.
I Climbed snowy mountains where icy winds licked my face.
I saw wondrous temples where stone carving danced on the walls,
and birds of all colors sang on the rooftops.
I pass through fruit groves eating as many papayas and mangos as I pleased.
I drank fresh water and rested in the shade of palm trees.
I cam to a city of tall buildings and counted zillions of windows, falling asleep before I could finish.
And so I spent enchanted hours far, far from our hunger and misery.
I forgave my father.
He was right, after all.
You know, I like this story because it took the boy out of his desprate situation to other
worlds that he enjoyed so much more.
It reminds me of when I was a boy of twelve.
I discovered an author by the name of Mark Twain and the name of the book was Huckleberry
Finn and it took me down the Mississippi River and lots of adventures that I wouldn't normally
have had in Youngstown Ohio.
Reading can do that for you.
It can take you to other worlds, other places,
other experiences that you would never normally have.
Thank you for watching Storyline Online and don't forget to check out all of our stories.
Keep watching. And keep reading.