You partied on it all summer long, now it's time go clean up the beach. Dr Jane Goodall will be in town tomorrow to help Taiwan clean up the shoreline at Liukuai north of Danshui as part of her Roots and Shoots network of community volunteers.
The Roots and Shoots program began when 16 students gathered with Dr Goodall on her front porch in Tanzania in 1991. The students were fascinated by animal behavior and concerned about the state of the environment. But their schools didn't cover these topics. The students wondered if they could further these interests through out-of-school activities.
PHOTO: AP
Their conversation ranged from how to help chimpanzees to how their actions might affect their communities. The 16 returned to their schools with a task: Find other interested young people and take action. And so the Roots and Shoots program was born.
Roots and Shoots groups undertake "service-learning" projects that promote care and concern for animals, the environment or the community. There are more than 6,000 groups ranging in size from two to 2,000 members registered in more than 87 countries.
Their mission is to foster respect and compassion for all living things, to promote understanding of all cultures and beliefs, and to inspire each individual to take action to make the world a better place for people, animals, and the environment.
And sometimes to clean up a beach. The local chapter of the International Jane Goodall Association will be picking up volunteers at the Hongshulin MRT station bright and early at 8:30am. Organizer Zhu Pei-wen (朱珮文) asked that no one be late, but said the bus may be making a second or third trip, depending on the number of volunteers. She also warned that the coastal winds at Danshui can be fierce and chilly and advised that everyone dress accordingly.
Following the clean-up, Dr. Goodall will give a talk on volunteering for the community at the lecture hall of Zhen Li University (真理大學活動中心演講廳). Box lunches will be made available.
Teachers, if you're interested in incorporating Roots and Shoots community-awareness programs into your class curriculum, there is information available on the Web, including lesson plans for all ages. Check out http://www.rootsandshoots.org/in-schools/default.asp for more information.
Performance notes:
WHAT: Beach Clean-up
WHERE: LiuKuai Beach. Meet for bus pick up at Honshulin MRT Station
WHEN: Tomorrow, Saturday, Dec. 4, at 8:30am. Clean-up will go until 4pm.
It starts out as a heartwarming clip. A young girl, clearly delighted to be in Tokyo, beams as she makes a peace sign to the camera. Seconds later, she is shoved to the ground from behind by a woman wearing a surgical mask. The assailant doesn’t skip a beat, striding out of shot of the clip filmed by the girl’s mother. This was no accidental clash of shoulders in a crowded place, but one of the most visible examples of a spate of butsukari otoko — “bumping man” — shoving incidents in Japan that experts attribute to a combination of gender
The race for New Taipei City mayor is being keenly watched, and now with the nomination of former deputy mayor of Taipei Hammer Lee (李四川) as the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) candidate, the battle lines are drawn. All polling data on the tight race mentioned in this column is from the March 12 Formosa poll. On Christmas Day 2010, Taipei County merged into one mega-metropolis of four million people, making it the nation’s largest city. The same day, the winner of the mayoral race, Eric Chu (朱立倫) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), took office and insisted on the current
Last week the government announced that by year’s end Taiwan will have the highest density of anti-ship missiles in the world. Its inventory could exceed 1,400, or enough for the opening two hours of an invasion from the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Snark aside, it sounds impressive. But an important piece is missing. Lost in all the “dialogues” and “debates” and “discussions” whose sole purpose is simply to dawdle and delay is what the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) alternative special defense budget proposal means for the defense of Taiwan. It is a betrayal of both Taiwan and the US. IT’S
March 16 to March 22 Hidden for decades behind junk-filled metal shacks, trees and overgrowth, a small domed structure bearing a Buddhist swastika resurfaced last June in a Taichung alley. It was soon identified as a remnant of the 122-year-old Gokokuzan Taichuu-ji (Taichung Temple, 護國山台中寺), which was thought to have been demolished in the 1980s. In addition, a stone stele dedicated to monk Hoshu Ono, who served as abbot from 1914 to 1930, was discovered in the detritus. The temple was established in 1903 as the local center for the Soto school
RSS