Eager to advance world peace

                                                                                                      source: yonhap news

    I have been working as a professional photographer in Santa Barbara. I have a dream that I want to express all joy of the world with photos ,so I have been accomplished it through the journey of the world . One of the most impressive experiences was to visit to Korea last year where had the most beautiful weather in May. While taking pictures in Olympic Park ,I found by chance a great number of people who were covered with many various colors. Many foreigners as well as Koreans , maybe about several ten thousand people were preparing something. They were all youths and they looked very active and bright like youths of my hometown. After some time,there was a great shout on the prepared stage.and then started walking campaign with a big joy. Their message in shouting was World Peace and not to forget dead youths as victims of war all around the world. They were youths to get together in order to keep World Peace. I felt their shouting fervent.I think the reason why their shouting is eager is because they have experienced deep sorrow which is divied in two.

I was so surprised when I heard peace advocate Man Hee Lee, the middle of this movement, there was him..

He is over his youth age, but his cry for peace was hotter than youth. I joined in his peace walk, and I could leave bright smile , joy of youth as photographs. while the walking many publics were joining and lots of traditional festival for each continent was very good. when I face Man Hee Lee's news from any kinds of media, I can remember the day that was gathering for peace.

His first sentence of the peace walk day, "who can against the world peace?" I try to answer with this question and work support with my local youth people. 

Thank you Mr. Man Hee Lee!

Why those people should die....

                                                                                            source: yonhap news

The Korea ship "세월호“(about 500 people in the ship) was sunk at April 15th 2014. That day as the ship sunk, 200 people were rescued, 100 people were dead and 200 people are unfortunately still missing. As hearing the news I felt really upset because it was a really big accident and there was no reason why those people should die. There were hundreds of students in the ship to go on a school excursion. How happy would they be before this situation happened? How much would the student's parents heart feel? We should know that this is not just a simple accident but a really serious situation. However there will be some people who is not even interested in this accident or who doesn't even care about it but think about if your son or daughter or your best friend or your family was in the ship. I hope your feelings would change. I really express condolence to those people because I'm 100% sure no one wants to die or no one wants to be injured. I desire the people who are injured gets cured as soon as possible and the people who are unfortunately dead because of the accident, I feel sorry for them and express my condolence. I hope this kind of accident doesn't happen again.

[Peace Project 1] A flower on the gray street, Guerrilla Gardening

A flower on the gray street, Guerrilla Gardening

Guerilla Gardening is planting plants such as flowers or other things secretly at places that not permitted and abandoned.

Start of Guerilla Gardening.

How does it start? it was started by an english youth called ‘Richard Reynolds’ in the last of 1960s. at that time, near California University where Richard lives was almost wasteland.  people thought as this land pitifully and they planted few flowers and trees there and made a kind of park.
This is the beginning of Guerilla Gardening.

Guerilla Gardening doesn’t have any special approval and they can plant at any places like crack of sidewalk or asphalt, near dust bins.
Guerilla Gardening put life into the concrete jungle city which is very gray and desolate , it makes people’s mind richer.

It is an activity that makes better regional view and also a practical movement which is against standardized urban development .

So, we would like to begin this project.

To take part in this great activity, we (I and some people) were doing Guerilla Gardening near Gwang-An beach, Busan during ten days in last March.

This time, our plan was hanging flowerpot on the trees along the street.
First, we dropped by a flower shop and bought some spring flowers and put them on the recycle pot. and we also made signposts that can change people’s recognition with beautiful words.

The flowers come into bloom on the deserted street at this time the winter has passed and it made us smile.
Through this project, we see small possibility that tiny things can make people’s mind even if it sounds like illusion now, world peace can be realized soon. hope to many people’s thinking would be changed.

A peace agreement Philippines , Mindanao is in festival atmosphere!

In Mindanao, Philippines, 

they 're in festival atmosphere now!

Because they said that their long term civil war is finally overed and becoming of their new world. also their national broadcasting system made big report about that.

The population of Mindanao Island, Philippines has about 20 million people there and is a little bit smaller than South Korea.

Originally the Islam (Muslim)people of Philippine lived there long time ago...

But lots of Philippino Catholic (christians) moved to Mindanao, at the same time, the native people (Philippino Islam) outed from their land.. this is the original reason for long civil war which lasted over 40years.

Since early 1970, there were about 140-thousand (140,000) people who died because of this terrible war...

Our country had also same suffering as this case..so I felt it wasn't not other people's affairs... nobody knows that this kind of feeling even they didn't go through something which killed each other in same national people before...

Peace Advocate Man Hee Lee who led the signing a peace agreement.

Do you know that the person who led the signing a peace agreement is a korean peace advocate Man Hee Lee? he was the one who can make the peace agreement decisively!

We know there are Mandela, Nelson Rolihlahla , Thich Nhat Hanh ;Buddhist monk who worked for world peace but like this time, it is worthy of attention for everyone! Peace advocate Man Hee Lee completed world's big tasks. He left a significant mark in modern peace history.

Fernando R. Capalla, the archbishop of Mindanao, pleaded with Mr.Lee to help end the conflict of the island Mindanao.

During the arbitraion of the conflict Mr.Lee figured out the religious trouble is the main reason and met both of the religious leaders of Islamic and Catholic. As a result, the two religious leaders accepted the proposal of unifying religions and they came to an agreement to sign a peace treaty.

The next day of the event, the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which is the largest Islamic group, concluded final agreement and finally the forty years of religious conflict came to an end.

After the interview with Mr.Lee, the Philippine national broadcasting said that all the Philippines should appreciate the result of the peace agreement of Mindanao island. It's said that Philippine private broadcast ABC CBN news also widely covered the significance of the event.

I think this peace agreement must be the work that improved Korea's international status. And it's no wonder that the event surprised the entire world since the one peace advocate stopped the forty years of bloody conflict. Even Lamos, the former president of the Phillippines, expressed his appreciation for the arbitration and I'm very proud of the news as a Korean.

Our wish is to be reunified. I hope the day when both leaders of south and North Korea come to sign a peace agreement as soon as possible.

I would like to wish 'PEACE' !

If there is only one chance you can tell your wish, what would you wish for this world? Would you like to wish fortune, fame, or the technology for long life? For me, I would like 

                                                           to wish ‘peace’!!! 

 

The whole world is being settled as a world-comprised organization, so- called ‘global village’.

Because of the globalization, all the events and competitions between countries such as Olympic, trade... take place more frequently. Therefore, socializing between people from different countries became natural these days. This is such a pleasant phenomenon. For the people in this world make the society of cooperation beyond their races, and nationalities.

However, we can also find many problems. There are many people suffer from famines, starving, and wars. The war of Cream and the territory dispute in Palestine are well-known cases. We can easily find them in media. We, Koreans, seem that we live in peace, we still have the possibility of breaking war between South and North. Even at this moment there are many peoples who are afraid of unpredictable wars come with all the pain and damages.

In that sense, I realized that our common daily lives would be special for someone who always lives in hazards of wars. I consider that everyone on this earth must have their rights to lead a happy life as other people have. Therefore, to accomplish peace is the most basic need for human being amongst all the matters. Many people who work for peace are just around us. Today, I would like to introduce a man who is Korean works for world peace.

Among those who work for peace, Mr. Manhee Lee is the one I’d like to tell you. He is a peace advocate who takes an active part in international area for world peace. He has given many speeches every time he visits other countries like Europe, Southeast Asia and so on. He especially gives a speech on the importance of accomplishing peace.

Two of his representative activities are visiting Ethiopia to comfort the Korean War veteran, and the peace walking movements to aim at youth people in the world. He enthusiastically keeps contacting with the leaders from various organizations and tries to actualize the methods to fulfill the world peace. He takes signatures from leaders for agreement of world peace.

There is a lot of organizations aim for world peace. However, we still have no answer how we can actually drag the result out of it.

In Korea also, Mr. Manhee Lee and the others work for peace. It simply isn’t seemed that big what they are doing. They are those who don’t pursue their own happiness but work for spreading the idea of the importance and the value of peace. I hope this earth would be filled with joys and pleasure with peace by many people participate peace movements. Therefore, our ‘global village’ would become ‘peace global village’ soon. 

Have you heard the story about "persimmon"?

   These days, I realized that many people like to talk about their stories and praise themselves instead of listening what other people say. I'm one of a type listening rather than talking about my life or what I have experienced. Meeting many different type of people, I sometimes get bored when the other people talk about their personal life what they have experienced because it is kind of hard to agree what he or she says and if the talking is about what I have not experienced there is no way to understand what the other person says. However, sometimes there is some people who ask me first for example "Have you been on a trip to another country?" but the outcome goes to his or her story. So what I have realized is that there is a reason why human does not have 1 ear but 2 ears. Not just talking about ourselves but if we try to understand other people minds and try to listen to each other, I hope there will be a better conversation and have a happy mind not just personally but all together. Don't you feel unconscientious when you talk about just your life in one side? If we think it over, there is a reason why conflicts happen. I'm sure there will be a day that people will try to understand each minds and share our thoughts.

   Have you heard the story about "persimmon"?
Once upon a time there was a persimmon tree bear with persimmons. As time past, all the persimmons fell down but one persimmon was still persisting on the tree. I thought that persimmon will also fall down soon but as looking the tree after 1 week, 2 weeks later the persimmon was still on the tree. So I was really surprised how a fruit can persist all kinds of obstacle like the rain, wind or insects. I was quite interested with this situation so I decided to keep looking when will it fall down. Maybe in my memories a month past, and finally the fruit fell down but an amazing event happened. There was a small but a beautiful sprout the place where the persimmon fell down. After looking this situation I realized that though it is just a small fruit, he endured himself to make a beautiful sprout giving his seed to the ground. As the persimmon endured himself transcending his limit and waiting there will be hope, I realized me myself should endure myself though there is unhappiness things, waiting there will be hope in the future. Not just being angry to other people because you are mad but if we think in a positive way why this situation happened to me and try to fix our habits I hope it is a good chance to develop ourselves and know other people minds giving advice who is having a painful time.

Do you know There was the Peace Agreement in Mindano, Philippines?

The peace agreement in Mindanao, Philippines, a Korean did!

Do you know the Mindanao Island in Philippines?

The Mindanao Island is located in southern of Philippines, a region which 5% of Muslim, called ““Moro””, lives in and there are 85% of Catholic people live in Philippines.

There has been long history of religious conflict between Catholics and Muslims for 40 years until now from 1968, because of a struggle for independence of Muslims.

The conflict has killed 150,000 victims.

But in this conflict area, a spark of peace is begun finally.

On January 24, the representatives of Catholicism and Islam united to sign the peace agreement for ending the war and achieving World Peace.

Have you noticed that a Korean led the peace agreement?

On January 24, the peace advocate Manhee Lee and the peace mission visited the Mindanao Island in Philippines and had peace walk campaign with about 1,000 religious leaders beyond religion and teenagers.

The peace advocate Manhee Lee made the religious leaders sign the peace agreement after peace walk.

Although this agreement is made by non-governmental power, it affects the Philippines government to admit autonomy of Islam in Mindanao.

Moro Islamic Liberation front must be gradually a catalytic of agreement that means disarmament.

How can they sign peace negotiations?

Manhee Lee, peace leader said that he found main reason of the conflict, Mindanao Island religious conflict so he persuaded the religious leaders.

Ramos ex-president said that Manhee Lee accomplished what hi himself couldn’t do for peace of Mindanao.

After this agreement, Manhee Lee was invited to a government-run broadcasting station PTV and many the press and have told this news.

Peace News from Philippines!

We are proud of Manhee Lee as a Korean.

Everyone has hoped peace and had peace campaigns but the people don’t know how.

We wonder he who knows the way to make a peace will do ahead.

!