A Coin for the Soul of Xu Wang 　　 　　Almost all the Chinese people with my age have seen the cartoon"The Wonderful Adventures of Nils" written by Nobel Prize Winner Selma Lagerlof. It was about a bad boy who was enchanted to the size of a thumb, and whisked off on the back of a goose.In the Chapter “The City at the Bottom of the Sea”, the author told us such a story: When Nils landed on a shore with his wild goose, he found a rusted coin. But because the coin was so corroded, he didn’t pick it up. Then he found the city of Vineta, used to be the center of commerce a few hundred years ago. The City was so rich and so fortunate, that no city had ever been more glorious; but its inhabitants, unluckily, gave themselves up to arrogance and negligence of money. As a punishment, the city was overtaken by a flood, and sank into the sea. But these inhabitants could not die, nor was their city destroyed. And one night in every hundred years, it rose in all its splendor up from the sea, and remained on the surface just one hour. If anybody outside could spend just one cent for anything, the city would be saved. Unfortunately Nils made the same mistake. Sometime, only until something has been lost, could we realize how important it is. 　　This morning, I got the bad news. Xu Wang, Mr. Nice Guy of my undergraduate class, passed away because of a car accident tragedy. My heart was stopped, my brain was numbed and my feeling was frozen. I still could not believe it was a truth, because he still seemed just besides me. 　　There are so many college black-and-white pictures bursting out of my minds. I still remember, when he was freshman, his bewildered face after hearing his first adult joke. I still remember, just before he was sophomore, he and I crawled for six hundred meters in the military training. I still remember, when he was junior, he had the biggest hard disk in the class: 420M bytes. I still remember, when he was senior. I was so jealous for his score in the course of Random Process. I still remember, at the end of graduation ceremony, I just waved him to say good byte. At that time, I didn’t know how important the friendship was. 　　Two weeks ago, I phoned him. He told me a lot about his future: his plan for study, his girlfriend and his work. I could feel that he was full of hope. After our talk, I found a red tulip outside the window in the black-and-white background. I knew that the spring was coming after so long a winter. 　　Mr. Cai phoned me this morning to tell me about the unbelievable news. He said the God must be blind to take away such a nice guy from us. I phoned brother Qiang to confirm what I heard. He told me that he still could not accept that the guy, who studied, played and drank together for eight years, just lost. Mr. Tong sent an email that his parents had a reunion after 30 years of graduation and they said “Yi2 Ge4 Ye3 Bu4 Neng2 Shao3”. But we have lost one just four years after graduation. I began to realize that it was a truth. 　　Then I began to feel guilty. If only I could warn him that driving was very dangerous, he might still be with us. If only I could treat him more careful like a brother, he might still enjoy the life. If only I didn’t ignore the most valuable friendship, he might still plan his good future. I feel that I just missed the coin to save his life. 　　I still believe that I can find the coin to let him resurrect. But at least I know that I will try my best to help his parents. I will attend his funeral to see him last time. I will do whatever I can to soothe his soul. Believe me my friend and please rest in peace in the heaven. 　　 　　Zhu Han 　　A sleepless night in 4/15/01

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