Tree-planting queen Cheng Li-yi guards the coastline: Seeing the trees over there just makes you feel good

Perhaps it was because she had already experienced in childhood how much beauty trees, living in interdependence with people, can bring to life and the environment that Cheng Li-yi, director of the coastal afforestation project at the Tse-Xin Organic Agriculture Foundation, could embrace an ever-burning passion amid the hardships of tree conservation and coastal afforestation. "Don't you think that just seeing the trees over there makes you feel good?" Faced with the difficult problem of coastal afforestation, Cheng Li-yi responded sincerely with a childlike innocence and fearlessness.

Last year, Cheng Li-yi received the "2018 First Taiwan Acts of Goodness Award," an award intended to honor practitioners in Taiwan, China, who devote themselves to caring for the disadvantaged, social issues and environmental protection. Recalling the moment she fell in love with trees, Cheng Li-yi said that when she was little, her family was renovating their house, and a large tree grew in the middle of the house. Her father deliberately dug a hole, and the house was carefully renovated around the trunk, with the tree growing strong upward alongside the house. The daylight shone on this large tree and also illuminated Cheng Li-yi's path of interdependence with trees.