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American teacher takes jar of sand as symbol of shared ground in forest he helped grow in China_我的网站

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    Ronald Sakolsky fills a jar with sand from the Mu Us Desert in Inner Mongolia, planning to bring it back to the US, on August 24, 2026. Photo: Lin Xiaoyi
On Monday afternoon, Ronald Sakolsky, an American teacher, set foot once again on the soil of the Mu Us Desert, in the Uxin Banner of Ordos, North China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. He first came here in 2000. Back then, the land was little more than drifting sand. Today, it is green with trees – a transformation driven by decades of local effort.
He stood within Sakolsky Forest, a woodland formally named to honor his early donation toward local ecological restoration. There, he carried out a plan he had held long before this trip: filling a jar with sand from the desert to bring home to the US.
More than two decades ago, sand was the one thing this place had in abundance. In 1999, when Sakolsky arrived in China as a participant in a bilateral teacher exchange program, he was moved by the tireless efforts of Chinese desert fighter Yin Yuzhen and her husband to curb desertification in the Mu Us Desert. He raised $5,000 – equivalent in 1999 to three years of income for Yin’s entire family – to fund their local tree-planting initiative.
The young saplings bought with that donation have since matured into more than 50,000 full-grown trees, transforming the once desolate, sandy wasteland into a thriving green landscape.
When Sakolsky met Yin at the airport on Sunday, 26 years after his first visit to Inner Mongolia, he joked that he could not take a tree from the Mu Us Desert, but he could slip some sand into his shoes and carry a piece of the land back with him. Now, he had found exactly the sand he wanted – not just any sand, but from a place where persistence had turned desert into life, and where his own name had become part of that story.
“Promise is a promise,” he said. “Ms. Yin made a promise, and she fulfilled it.”
For Sakolsky, the sand is not just dirt. It is a metaphor, a bridge, a shared ground. He plans to tell his grandchildren what it means. “It’s not just a piece of sand in the jar,” he said. “It’s a jar of love.”
He used the jar of sand to symbolize that America and China share a relationship rooted in the same soil. He shook the jar, holding its two ends as if they were the two countries, and said that it shows we’re all on the same planet.
There is an old American joke, he noted, that if you dig a hole deep enough, you will eventually reach China. “We’re all on the same planet,” he said.
Earlier that day, while visiting Yin’s home, he spoke about the need for Americans and Chinese to see each other as family. “All Americans should understand that Chinese people and Americans can be family,” he said. “We can transcend differences if we focus on our common ground. We all love our countries, and we all value loyalty and respect – these are the shared virtues we hold dear.”
As for the sand he collected, Sakolsky said he would treat it as a treasure, alongside all his other precious keepsakes from China. He expects to display it in his living room – a daily reminder of the forest that carries his name and the people who made it grow.
。    장동혁 "조금도 지체해선 안 돼"정점식 "네팔, 각별히 신경 써 달라"                   국민의힘 장동혁 대표와 정점식 원내대표 ⓒ데일리안 홍금표 기자[데일리안 = 김주훈 기자] 국민의힘은 네팔 홍수로 현지 수력 발전소 건설에 참여 중인 우리 국민이 실종되자, 정부를 향해 가능한 모든 노력을 다해야 한다고 당부했다. 사태를 해결하기 위해 당 차원의 협력도 약속했다.장동혁 대표는 26일 페이스북을 통해 "네팔 홍수로 현지에서 수력 발전소를 건설 중이던 우리 국민 8명이 연락 두절되고, 10명이 고립되는 사태가 발생했다"며 "모두 무사히 신속하게 귀환하길 진심으로 기원한다"고 밝혔다.이어 "네팔 정부에서 긴급히 대응에 나섰고, 우리 정부도 최단 시간 내에 정부 합동 신속 대응팀을 파견할 예정"이라면서 "한시가 급한 만큼, 조금도 지체해서는 안 될 것"이라고 강조했다.이재명 정부를 향해선 "가능한 모든 노력을 다해주길 바란다"며 "국민의힘도 필요한 지원에 협력을 아끼지 않겠다"고 당부했다.정점식 원내대표는 연락두절되고 고립된 우리 국민 18명이 현지 수력 발전소 건설에 참여한 직원인 만큼, 네팔 정부의 각별한 대응을 요청했다.정 원내대표는 "지금 연락두절되고 고립된 우리 국민 18명은 여행객들이 아니라 현지에서 수력 발전소를 건설하던 한국남동발전과 두산에너빌리티 소속 직원들"이라고 했다.그러면서 "인명에 경중은 없지만, 네팔 국민을 위해 필요한 기반 시설을 짓기 위해 계약을 맺고 일하는 직원"이라면서 "네팔 당국이 더욱 각별히 우리 대한민국 국민의 수색과 구조에 신경 써주길 바란다"고 요청했다.또한 "이재명 정부는 외교력과 가용 수단을 총동원해 우리 국민이 모두 안전하게 집으로 돌아오게 해주길 바란다"고 촉구했다.。

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Published on:15:05:40