SIR - A friend visiting me from Droitwich was kind enough to bring six Worcester News which after living away from Worcester in Addis Ababa for nine years gave me an insight into grass roots of what makes the city tick over as it does a part of life I had completely forgotten.

Items in the Worcester news that took my attention being the number of charities supported by enthusiastic hard working groups putting in so much effort for their chosen cause.

Not being involved with Worcester in any way I find seeing this, a way of life from an outsiders vantage point where having done a day work the good city inhabitants find time and energy to help someone they might never meet.

Sadly there is a darker side to Worcester that leaves me asking why. In a society where no one need go without food or shelter there are those who steal bikes in order to convert them into money, money stolen from a Lowesmoor pub, power tools this type of crime just continues. A good samaritan helped a lady involved with a dispute with men and was badly beaten.

Education is not lacking in UK but this behaviour casts a shadow where so many people are striving to build maybe better health care or save grass lands from being lost to modern farming methods.

Fortunately the good that people do outweighs the bad to make Worcester a city to be proud of.

I now get a regular supply of Worcester News in my corner of Ethiopia.

No jokes about a delivery boy on a bike please.

J G PRITCHARD Ethiopia