For Remembrance Day 1999 I was asked to run a service for children. I couldn't find any information about war or why people fight in wars that was suitable for use with this age group. I decided to write a story that could be used as a starting point for a discussion about why wars start and why it is important that people fought. The cause of this war was intentionally trivial. Some people may feel that a more pacifist message should have been used but I felt that while this is important it was out of place on Remembrance Day. The story was originally told with two actors, one "hilly" and one "flat" each with suitable props that will become apparent if you read the story. Reading the story aloud takes approximately 10 minutes If you enjoy the story and decide to use it I would be pleased to know how it goes.
The Hillies and The Flats
Once upon a time at the far end of the Galaxy there was a small planet that circled a large orange sun. On the planet there were two huge islands that floated very slowly in a cherry coloured sea. They floated so slowly that they had been separated for millions of years and the people of each island did not know the other island existed. The islands were called Hilly and Flat. Hilly was indeed hilly with beautiful rolling hills and deep valleys. Flat was, as its name suggests, quite flat, but still beautiful as it was covered in forests and farms. The people of Hilly and Flat were happy and had everything they needed. The weather was always good with plenty of sunshine and enough rain, always falling at night, to grow food. Tea grew especially well on both islands. The flats (for that is what we will call the people of flat) always made a great ceremony out of drinking tea. It always came in a pot, with bone china cups on a silver tray with an embroidered tray cloth and the milk was always poured in first. The hillies also loved tea, in great big steaming mugs. They had invented little bags so they didn't have to bother with a pot, they could make it straight in the mug and add the milk afterwards.
Generations past and eventually the two islands drifted closer together, until, on a clear day you could just see Hilly from the coast of Flat. At first a few brave flats ventured to Hilly in boats. Then, as they drifted closer trade routes were set up and the people of each island enjoyed tasting the tea grown on the other island. Eventually they drifted close enough for some of the richer people to take holidays on the other island. The flats loved the hills and valleys of Hilly and the hillies loved walking through the Flat forests, not having to struggle up and down hills. Everything seemed ideal.
But that is when the trouble started. One day a holidaymaker from Flat thought he would like a nice cup of tea on the balcony of his hotel room on Hilly. The tea arrived in a large steaming mug; the waiter also brought the milk in a small plastic jug so he could add just the right amount. The man from Flat was horrified, how could they get something so simple so wrong? What sort of people were they?
He went home immediately and got together with some of his friends on Flat. They made a pot of tea, put the milk in the china cups and poured the tea in. While they enjoyed their cups of tea they talked: - Obviously the people of Hilly are not as good as we are, perhaps they aren't very clever, they don't care about things that matter, surely people who put the milk in after the tea don't even bath, we certainly wouldn't want them coming over here giving our people ideas. We should show them how to live properly, we could put some order into their society, we can give them new laws to keep them in order. We don't want them coming to our island for our tea they don't know how to use it properly, we will go over to their land and get them to grow tea for us, we can change their farming system, make them grow more, it doesn't matter if they have to work harder, they don't really matter. After all - they think differently to us.
The Flats started making their plans. They formed an army and invaded Hilly. When they got there they made new laws. No one was allowed to use teabags any more and the milk had to be added to the cup (not mug) first. Then they started making the farms more efficient moving people around, OK some of the people had to leave the homes they had grown up in, some had to leave families and friends but that didn't matter, after all they thought differently to the flats.
The hillies of course did not like what was happening at all, they liked their homes, their farms and their families and they especially liked a steaming mug of tea, with the milk added last. So they asked the flats to go home and leave them to get on with their own lives. But the hillies didn't matter, they thought differently to the flats. The flats wanted the best for the hillies and if that meant forcing them to live in a civilised way then that is what they would have to do. So they made guns, they didn't really intend to use them, they just made them feel more powerful and more important. They might have to shoot one or two hillies to keep order but that didn't matter, after all the hillies thought differently to the flats.
Sadly the hillies realised that if their lives were to continue as they had been they would have to do something about it. They made guns and some of them formed an army. The Hilly army marched to each of the towns and villages and farms where the flats had taken over and forced the flats out. Sometimes the flats retreated, but often they fought. Many lives were lost on both sides. Both sides had a glorious cause to fight for. The hillies wanted to defend their lifestyle; the flats wanted to make everyone have a better lifestyle, theirs.
Little by little the hillies regained their land. Eventually the last flats fled back to their island with the hillies guarding the beaches behind them. That night the hillies held a great party drinking mugs of steaming tea, with the milk put in last. The next day they began to count how many hillies had died, it seemed like every town and village had lost someone. The flats were also sad, they had also lost many people fighting the hillies and they had only wanted to make them live properly.
Some time later a boat set out from Hilly, the flats were scared, were the hillies going to attack them? But it was a small group of leaders from Hilly who wanted to talk to the leaders of Flat. They held a meeting with tea made in both ways, they agreed that everyone mattered, no matter how they drank their tea. Some people even tried it made the way it was made on the other island and found it wasn't so bad after all.
And so the planet settled down with its two islands at peace, each gaining from the experiences of the other and having a better life because of their new friends.
The people of Hilly never forgot the brave army who had fought for their lifestyle and died so they could live their way. And the people of Flat remembered those who had tried to show the hillies what they had thought was the best way to live. So now as the sun rises over the forest of Flat and sets over the hills of Hilly they always pause from drinking their tea and remember them.
This story is an aid or resource for use by individual churches and may not be included in any form of collection or anthology or other published work in any media. Use of the idea or adaptation does not permit wider use. If you are seeking to use this material for any of the a fore mentioned purposes please contact the author.