life After Peace Corps - Ethical Behavior

During the Bandelier trip, I found some beautiful Indian ceramic pieces and arrow heads scattering over the unexcavated ruin site, the Yapashi.  I was tempted to bring a few pieces home but it is against the Monument rules.  My hiking friend encouraged me to take one or two, so I pocketed them and then felt very guilty.   Aldo Leopold once said:

“Ethical behavior is doing the right thing when no one else is watching – even when doing the wrong thing is legal”

So I placed the pieces back to where they belonged. I was very proud of myself.  My weakest spot is picking flowers; I know I am not supposed to, but….. I am WORKING on it. 

Life After Peace Corps - New Mexico

None of us had prepared for what we saw inside the ranch; towering rock walls shimming with vivid colors of red, yellow, brown, and silver, a little spring murmuring euphoniously inside the Box Canyon, a young cottonwood with thousands of flickering emerald leaves abiding on a red hill, a still pool mirroring the bluest sky, and the Chimney Rock protruding above the surface of a barren land, enduring the acrid desert wind and dazzling hot sun. 

This majestic landscapes and dreamlike picturesque images imprint so deeply in me that I know someday, I shall return. 

Photographed by Tom Eddie

Written by Chi Chan

June 2013

Life After Peace Corps - the little nature in me

An artist puts this simple flower arrangement together for our building entrance.  This little un-flamboyant flower brings back sweet memories of my childhood in Hong Kong.  I only know its Chinese name.   It grew wild on the hillside behind my grandmother’s home.  I was 3 or 4 years old.  We were very poor and my grandmother could not even afford to buy me a doll to play with, so I had nothing but nature to keep myself busy.    I used this flower to make a colorful necklace, which made me very happy.  Perhaps that was the 1^st time I connected with nature, and the experience lasts for a life time……