More than 25 years ago, Saroo Brierley lived in rural India. One day, he played with his brother along the rail line and fell asleep. When he woke up and found himself alone, the 4-year-old decided his brother might be on the train he saw in front of him — so he got on.

That train took him a thousand miles across the country to a totally strange city. He lived on the streets, and then in an orphanage (孤儿院). There, he was adopted by an Australian family and flown to Tasmania.

As he writes in his new book, A Long Way Home, Brierley couldn’t help but wonder about his hometown back in India. He remembered landmarks, but since he didn’t know his town’s name, finding a small neighborhood in a vast country proved to be impossible.

Then he found a digital mapping program. He spent years searching for his hometown in the program’s satellite pictures. In 2011, he came across something familiar. He studied it and realized he was looking at a town’s central business district from a bird’s-eye view. He thought, “On the right-hand side you should see the three-platform train station” — and there it was.” And on the lef-hand side you should see a big fountain” — and there it was. Everything just started to match.

When he stood in front of the house where he grew up as a child, he saw a lady standing in the entrance. “There’s something about me,” he thought-and it took him a few seconds but he finally reminisced about what she used to look like.

In an interview Brierley says, “My mother looked so much shorter than I remembered. But she came forth and walked forward, and I walked forward, and my feelings and tears and the chemical in my brain, you know, it was like a nuclear fusion (核聚变). I just didn’t know what to say, because I never thought seeing my mother would ever come true. And here I am, standing in front of her.”

For the past 15 years, Denise has taught at a community school where students face significant economic and language challenges. In 2016, Denise met Dr. Jane Goodall at an event in the Bronx. Like Dr. Jane,   Denise, who has a background in forestry, is always connected with nature and animals. Soon after, she started a Roots &Shoots program at her school. “I love to inspire that same connection in my students, ”said Denise.

To kick off their project, Denise introduced her group (19 first graders and 8 fifth-graders) to community mapping. “Where do you live?What’s the name of your county?What’s the name of your state?”she asked. “So it starts in your own backyard, ”she explains, “and it progresses across the street to the park, where you see urban wildlife, and finally you start to look at the bigger picture. ”Students then observed homeless cats outside their school, and together, they took action to return them to where they were found.

The students led the entire project. “I was just a guide, "says Denise. “But that’s the point:They are going to love science and animals. They know they are the future and that they are the people who are the keepers of this planet. ”She also notes that students come to understand what positive choices can have: They discover their own strengths and even weaknesses. They identify partners’ efforts and they form friendships and bonds.

But ultimately, says Denise, “my goal was to try to teach compassion, namely sympathy.   That’s the biggest payoff she tries to convey to her students.” For other educators with a willing heart, she offers a few words of advice: Get students outside—even just to walk around the school grounds, guide them to build trust and put themselves in other’s shoes, and never give up!

As a child, I had spent my holidays travelling our village in Bangladesh — running across the rice fields or farms and fishing in lakes. But, this had started to wear off as a teen. One thing I remember about that trip was when we were only about half an hour from our village, we had to get out of our car. The road in front of us was completely under water. We all got on a bamboo boat for another two or three hours.

That was 15 years ago — the last time I visited our village. One by one, many other villagers left there. But my father has been working hard to build it up. He doesn’t want it to be lost.

Yes, we should protect our home. But there is something else to think about: climate crisis (气候危机). Bangladesh is at the centre of the climate crisis — it is hit by floods, droughts, storms and other natural disasters. “I jokingly say, Bangladesh is God’s laboratory for natural disasters,” says Prof Ainun Nishat, an expert on climate change from Bangladesh.

The period from June to October sees heavy rains. But the rainfall time is becoming more erratic (无常的). In 2020, Sylhet, my hometown, was hit by huge floods that affected thousands of families, whose homes were swept away. In fact, over a quarter of the country was flooded. Nearly 1.3 million homes were damaged, and hundreds of people died.

The weather is getting more extreme (极端的). It is getting too hot. And the supply of water can’t be relied upon, leaving the land getting drier.

Although people have worries about droughts and floods, unlike in the past, the country is well-prepared to deal with them. Prof Nishat says, “Maybe 20, 30 years back we depended on external (外部的) support to return to normal from any natural disaster, but now it’s different. The country has developed, and we suffered these disasters many times, so the people are one of the most prepared.”