The funeral of Rosa Parks was held on October 24, 2005, at Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, DC. She left us at the age of  92. We were all impressed by her bravery and integrity. She was the first lady of the civil rights movement who had a great influence on the destiny of African-Americans and society as a whole. On the day of her funeral, thousands of people visited to send her love.

       As I look back, the moment when she first refused to give up her seat to a white man was still vivid in my mind. The Jim Crow Laws stipulated that white passengers and colored passengers must divide their seats on the bus. The bus driver could  move the sign of “colored section” at any time, which meant that colored passengers needed to give their seats to white passengers at any time if there were no more seats left in the “white section.” I sat at the back of the “colored section” in the depressing atmosphere. As usual, no one wanted to talk on the bus. People were sitting there and staring straight toward the end of this journey. Therefore, nobody noticed that the seats were all filled up until the bus came to the third stop in front of the Empire Theater, where no one got off, but a few white passengers got on. The bus driver, James Fred Blake, noticed that there were still four white passengers standing on the bus with nowhere to sit. He moved the sign of “colored section” back two rows and demanded that four black passengers give up their seats. None of the four made a move.

       “Y'all better make it light on yourselves and let me have those seats,” Blake said harshly again to them.

It seemed like the air was frozen at that moment. A few seconds later, three of them stood up slowly and walked back. Unexpectedly, one lady didn’t get up to sit in the colored section. Instead, she moved to the other side of the seat in that section near the window.

       “Why don’t you get up?” Blake asked her with an enraged face.

       “ I don’t think I should have to stand up,” she answered, expressionless.

        Later, because she was arrested, I learned that her name was Rosa Parks. Blake called the police to deal with the “disobedient and unruly” person.

         “Well, if you don’t stand up, I’m going to have to call the police and have you arrested.”

         “You may do that, ” Rosa Parks said. Her courage surprised all of us who were on the bus. But  I should say that after her story spread all over the country, everyone was shocked.

          “Why do you push us around?” she asked the police when she was arrested.

          “I don’t know. But the law is the law, and you are under arrest.”

           That night I was awake for the whole night. Rosa Parks’s story was in my mind and kept me thinking instead of sleeping. She is the first one who queried in public why we shouldn’t have rights. I believe her story encouraged many of us to pursue our required rights.

          My speculation was right. Colored people boycotted taking the bus on Monday when Rosa Parks experienced an unfair judicial outcome in the court. The boycott lasted 381 days, which severely damaged the finances of the bus company.

          As far as we are concerned,  Rosa Parks is a dream-maker. She made all of us dare to dream. Her story encouraged us and brought us together against an unfair society. Her resistance on the bus influenced the destiny of colored people in the United States. The boycott was not only the beginning of American civil rights, but it was also the beginning of the victory of the fight of equality. Rosa Parks was only a normal colored woman who refused giving up her seat on the bus in order to stand up for her own rights. However, her brave rejection opened a great and equal world for centuries to come.