Lesson's Gain
Interview Content
After the interview with the Secretary-General and the President of The Society of Wilderness, we gained many valuable results that gave us a deeper understanding of The Society of Wilderness’s operations and the importance of environmental protection.
The Origin of SOW
SOW was originally known as the Taipei Wild Bird Association and began as a bird-watching association. However, as they observed the gradual destruction of bird habitats, their focus shifted towards protecting these essential environments for wildlife.
For example, when the Hushan Reservoir was built to protect the habitat of the eight-colored bird, the habitat of the eight-colored bird disappeared. Later, it was found that bird-watching activities could be used to protect the habitat. Therefore, the Bird Watching Society became the Bird Watching Association.
The Taiwan Environmental Defense League started with an anti-nuclear protest against the nuclear power plant issue and fought fiercely against it earlier.
When The Society of Wilderness was first established, the organization had Lee Wei Wen and the founding chairman: Hsu Jen-hsiu
. Chairman Lee Wei-Wen originally founded the club, the Minsheng Kenshi Association, and the meeting style is similar to a book club, so that you can learn more about problems through other organizations. Through the mode of making friends, the association introduces new people to meet at the regular gatherings held every month. During the process, a partner introduced Hsu Jen-hsiu to give a speech. At that time, Hsu Jen-hsiu specialized in writing books on ecotourism or eco-literature, and there were relatively few such writers at that time. In the early days of his speech at the Minsheng Kenshi Association, he mentioned that most of the photos in the slides were used to show the content of the speech, and the changes in the environment and ecology were seen from the photos.
The Call From SOW - Recovering The Connection Between Us And Nature
It’s been found that beach-cleaning activities affect a lot of marine life, so think about how you can change that in your daily life.
Drinking a bottle of Coke every day creates a plastic bottle, so if you change your habits, you can make a difference. The Society of Wilderness taps like-minded people from all sorts of places to become environmental volunteers and trains promotional speakers to give talks in schools to bring people into nature. They believe that humans come from nature, and the reason why we don’t try to protect it now is because we’ve gradually forgotten about it. The Society of Wilderness’s volunteers act as a bridge between people and nature, bringing people back to nature, and nature will bring people sensation.
Enjoy being led by The Society of Wilderness, lying in the forest, and looking at the stars, without any expectations, you will be touched with sensation by nature.
Secret of SOW - Nature Names
After joining The Society of Wilderness, everyone is accustomed to giving a “natural name”. As the name suggests, any name about the natural world is fine, as long as it represents you/your appearance, characteristics, or even personal preferences! The origin of natural name is originally from the days when Hsu Jen-hsiu lived in the Philippines, in last month Hsu Jen-hsiu for the new full-time class, mentioned that due to professional relations, there is a chance to live in the jungle of Mindoro Island in the Philippines, and found that the primitive people of the jungle have two different names, one is the real name, the other is the name of nature, so when Hsu Jen-hsiu founded The Society of Wilderness, he hoped that the partners of the society would take a natural name, and first through their own natural name, to understand this natural species. And then we can go out and learn everything about the natural world.
Professionalism Is Not The Focus, But The Communication
Most of the companions of The Society of Wilderness are “tree men” and are not experts in specialized disciplines. For example, the chairman of the board of directors himself is from the art department. The goal of The Society of Wilderness is not to impart knowledge, but to make people aware of the importance of the environment and ecology, and they hope that everyone can work together. The job of the narrator is to guide everyone into the world. Wilderness is more about expanding their reach, so a professional background is not a top priority for them. If someone feels that the commentary is not in-depth enough, they will even invite that person directly to share on stage, because it is a communication, not a comparison of who is more. They will arrange breaks during their speeches, and if someone feels that the content is not suitable for them, they can leave the venue at this time. They also design all kinds of interesting bridges to attract interested people, and the design itself is like an automatic filtering mechanism. Sometimes, what they’re sharing can be difficult to understand, so they’ll add lots of photos to help them understand and make it easier for everyone to understand.
The Slide Projector That Has Touched Countless People
When the Minsheng Kenshi Association invited Hsu Jen-hsiu to give a speech, there was no projector at that time, so he could only use a slide projector to display photos for everyone to see Hsu Jen-hsiu played the wilderness scenery he photographed through the slide projector and compared the past and present environmental changes so that everyone could deeply feel the changes in the natural landscape. In the past, nature was more primitive and pure, and the habitats of many animals and plants were relatively intact. However, with the passage of time and human development, these beautiful landscapes have gradually changed, and some areas have even disappeared. When these images were projected on the slide projector, many people were deeply moved, not only by the beauty of the wilderness, but also by the change in the environment, and by the importance of protecting the natural environment. Through these images, Hsu Jen-hsiu conveyed the value of wilderness conservation to everyone, hoping to arouse more people’s hearts to care about the environment and cherish nature. This speech not only brought people knowledge, but also planted the seeds of environmental awareness in the hearts of many people, and the impact was far-reaching.
Reflections From The Interview
Harry Wang: This time, we interviewed the chairman and secretary-general of the Society of Wilderness (SOW). In our previous visit, we learned that everyone in SOW has a nature name. The chairman’s name is Lee Chi-Ting, and his nature name is “Earth (Chief)” The secretary-general’s name is Hsieh Chun-tung, and his nature name is “Blue Whistling Thrush” I think one interesting thing about SOW is that everyone has their own unique nature name. The secretary-general even shared some really funny nature names with us. Since each person’s nature name is special and meaningful, we thought the name “Society of Wilderness” must also have a special meaning. However, the chairman told us that “wilderness” actually has no specific meaning. We were quite surprised, as we had expected there to be a deeper significance behind it. One of the most memorable parts of the interview was when the chairman and secretary-general showed us a slide projector. In the early days, when Mr. Hsu Jen-hsiu held lectures, he used a slide projector to display images that deeply moved people, inspiring them to join SOW. Although the organization no longer uses slide projectors to show images, seeing one in person was really special because we rarely get to see them nowadays. They also told us how lucky we are today—back then, if a slide got burned, it would cost at least 600 NTD to replace, whereas digital images don’t have this problem. SOW’s lectures are quite unique. They prefer not to focus too much on professional knowledge. Instead, their goal is to encourage people to reconnect with nature and experience it firsthand. Some attendees may expect to gain a lot of specialized knowledge from the lectures, so before each event, SOW informs them in advance that if the content does not meet their expectations, they are welcome to leave midway. There are even designated moments during the lecture for people who feel it’s not what they expected to exit. Participating in SOW’s activities is not about acquiring professional knowledge; rather, it is about using storytelling to introduce people to environmental protection. I think this makes SOW very different from other environmental organizations. After our last interview with the secretary-general, he introduced us to SOW’s special group called the “Parent-Child Group,” which piqued our interest, making us want to learn more about it. The Parent-Child Group is a program where both parents and children must join together. Every year, children are asked whether they wish to continue. This group not only allows children to have a happy childhood but also lets parents relive the feeling of youth and companionship. Because of this, many parents are reluctant to leave even after their children graduate. The group instills environmental awareness, with different parents teaching different children, fostering mutual learning. It’s a truly special program, and after hearing about it, we all wanted to join.Some people think environmental protection is difficult, but through various activities and team-led experiences, SOW makes it something that everyone can participate in.
Roy Yang:
During this visit, I met the chairman of The Society of Wilderness, also known as the Chief. He has worked in the wilderness for 20 years. He used to do multimedia and help convert some paper publications into presentations. It was for this reason that he decided to join an environmental organization. The purpose of establishing the wilderness is to enclose households’ land to achieve the goal of ecological protection. As for whether it has been helped before, the most recent one was when Wilderness received a 1.5 million inheritance. This do-gooder was a man who didn’t have a deep connection with the wilderness but wanted to help nature. The structure of the wilderness is very special, consisting of 12 committees, each committee will have full-time staff and volunteers. Of course, they also encountered difficulties and doubts. The chairman said everyone will inevitably encounter difficulties, but it will be fine if you know you are right. There is another very special activity in the wilderness, which is the parent-child group. Every parent will take their children to the wilderness to make friends and learn about the ecology. But if the parents are unwilling to come, the children will naturally be unable to stay.
Justin Hsiao:
During this visit, everyone did what they should do, so I think this visit went really smoothly. This time we all learned more about our The Society of Wilderness. We saw a projector that was used a long time ago. It looked different from the one we have today. It had a bunch of holes in it. After listening to the projector introduced by the mayor, I felt that his usage was even cooler than the current one. One thing that impressed me the most was that a person suddenly donated 1.5 million to The Society of Wilderness. At first, they were all frightened by this scene and wanted to say, “Why would someone donate such a large sum of money to us? He is not one of ours.” Later, they went to investigate this person’s personal information and found that It was said that this was a legacy. This person was a nurse. He didn’t know how he knew about this place, but it seemed that his friend told her about it, so he donated so much money. Later, the association used this money plus fundraising money to buy a piece of land for protection. Another thing I thought was interesting is that they have family groups. This group is very cool. They use children to lead adults to protect this land. Their rule is that as long as parents cannot accompany their children to participate, but the children can, they cannot participate. In other words, as long as the parents do not come, they cannot participate. They teach children concepts and then let them experience it for five days. In those five days, they have changed a lot. If parents want to use plastic bags, the children will come forward and explain why they should not use plastic bags. At first, the number of people who signed up for the parent-child group was very small, but year after year, the number of people who signed up filled up. It was so exaggerated that even the iron gate outside had to be pulled down.