I once saw a true story on TV about a botanist who starved to death alongside a massive amount of food, and it was intense. Though there is a glimmer of hope.
During World War II, a city in Russia was besieged by enemy forces. In that city, there was a botanical research institute that stored a huge quantity of plant seeds collected from all over the world. Right before the enemy encirclement, soldiers urged the botanists to evacuate the city, but three of the scholars refused, saying, "We must protect the seeds."
These seeds were preserved for the sake of future humanity, with the purpose of being "sown across the earth if a great disaster ever devastates the world."
Cut off from supplies by the siege, the people of the city suffered from starvation and the cold. Although the plant seeds could have been eaten as food, the scholars desperately endured their hunger to protect them.
One of the scholars went to collect food rations and died—either attacked by thugs or collapsing on the street. The remaining two survived their hunger by stripping wallpaper and licking the glue on the back.
The second scholar began hallucinating the first scholar who had died, and soon passed away as well. The third scholar somehow managed to survive until the city was liberated.
The seeds protected by the scholars were put to use by being sown in Africa, which was suffering from a food crisis.
It left me with such an intense feeling. I know for a fact that I wouldn't be able to hold out and would end up devouring the seeds myself. It also left me feeling uneasy about a man who came to steal the seeds from the institute and yelled at the scholars, "I have starving children! Which is more important, the people living right now or the people of the future?"
Comments (-)