I once did a year of voluntary service in a residential(居住的) home for people with learning disabilities. It was set in an English village deep in the countryside, quite different from my home in Sweden. One of my fellow volunteers, a girl from Tanzania, seemed a little unhappy, so I asked what the problem was. She told me she had a friend back home who had financial difficulties and maybe it was impossible for her to complete her university courses.

    So this friend of mine had sent all her money to Tanzania to support her friend! This meant that she didn't have much food to eat and no money to go anywhere outside the village.

    I was so moved and I felt I had to do something. So, during my next trip to one of the nearby towns I walked into a shop. I didn't have much money left myself but I thought I'd buy her an extra box of chocolate we both liked and some rice. I started talking to the woman (also a volunteer) working in the shop and finally told her about my friend.

     The woman looked at me, amazed. "Does she eat pasta?" she asked. "Yes," I replied. She immediately started loading a bag with pasta, cookies, and other things until the bag was full. "Give her this for me. It's my treat!" I couldn't believe it but accepted with happiness. As I left the shop to go home with my unexpected bag of food. I asked the woman her name. "Just Gloria," she said.

    Imagine my friend's face when I arranged the gifts on my kitchen table and attracted her from room to see! I had never seen her so happy! A few weeks later she found Gloria in the shop and thanked her in person.

    These two extraordinary(非凡的) women really showed me what true kindness and compassion(同情) are, and the impression will stay with me for the rest of my life!

    Zhao Yishen, the 33-year-old artist, is carving a woodblock (雕刻木板) carefully, with a chisel in his right hand. To carve the woodblocks, he has to hold this position for six hours. He has been carving woodblocks since 2012. “It feels good and looks beautiful when a Chinese character slowly appears on the woodblock under your chisel," says Zhao.

    Zhao is now the only full-time carver working at a workshop that creates woodblock-printed books in Beijing. As a teenager he loved to read ancient Chinese books in the library, and the curiosity of how the books were made led him to get a job at an ancient books woodblock printing studio in Yangzhou in 2011 after graduating as a law major from university.

    Block printing was listed as a UNESCO World Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2009. Zhao started to learn the skill from Chen Yishi, one of the skill's masters, in 2012.

    "The first step is to learn how to sharpen your chisel, "says Zhao. “After using it for a while, you need to sharpen it again." After that, the woodblock must be put at a certain angle that is deep enough to show up the characters and also to make sure the cuts are deep enough-but not too deep. Then Zhao puts the paper, face down, onto the wood after brushing oil on the paper. This helps to transfer the characters onto the block. Once the carving is finished, the woodblock is brushed with ink and paper pressed onto it. It is ready to print.

    In Zhao's mind, the inked woodblock is a work of art. After a year of learning from Chen, Zhao found a job at Zhuyu Shanfang in 2013. His carved woodblocks have been used for several books over the past six years. "I just learned the basic skills, but to master it, I still need years of practice,” says Zhao. “A good craftsman can carve an entire book with every single character aligned in order."