The Story of Chopsticks筷子的故事

李蓓

“身体细长，兄弟成双，光爱吃菜，不爱喝汤。（打一日常用具）。”同学们，这个谜语大家有没有猜过呢？大家知道说的是什么东西吗？这说的就是我们平时经常会见到，吃饭总会用到的筷子。筷子很平常，但却很有用，而且还是中国古代的一项重要发明呢。关于筷子的故事，你们了解多少呢？

China was the first country in the world to use chopsticks and has a history of more than 3，000 years eating meals with chopsticks. Chinese people usually use bamboo（竹子） or wood to make chopsticks. And it was common（普通的） for rich people to use silver（银的） or gold（金的） chopsticks in the old days.

There are many different legends（传说） of the origin（起源） of chopsticks. One is about a great man named Dayu.

There were big floods（洪水） in the times of Yao and Shun. So they sent Dayu to control（治理） the floods. Dayu was a kind and hardworking man. He decided to finish his work successfully（成功地）. When doing his work， Dayu passed by his own house three times， but each time he did not go back in. He saved（節省） every minute to work on the floods.

One day， Dayu came to an island（岛） by boat. He felt very hungry and began to cook meat in a pot（锅）. When the meat was done， it was too hot to eat with his hands. But it would take him too much time for the meat to cool off. So he used two twigs（细枝） to take the meat out and ate it. And from then on， he had his meals in this way to save time. Other people began to eat their meals like Dayu did. So chopsticks came to be.