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Rev. Sun Myung Moon

As a Peace-loving Global Citizen is the autobiography of Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the founder of the Unification Movement. It was published in 2009 in both Korean and English by Gimm-Young Publishers of Seoul, South Korea. The book was released in South Korea on March 9, 2009 and debuted at #3 on the Businesss bestseller's list. It has ranked in various bestseller lists since then and was ranked 15th on the General bestseller's list as of October 14, 2009.

Loving Nature to Learn from It

  
      “Yong Myung, please come down,” she would say. “It’s late, and you need to come in and go to bed.”

       “If I get sleepy, I can sleep up here.” 

       It didn’t matter what she said; I wouldn’t budge from my branch in the chestnut tree. Finally, she would lose her temper, and shout at me, “Hey, monkey! Get down here now!”

       Maybe it’s because I was born in the Year of the Monkey that I enjoyed climbing trees so much. When chestnut burrs hung in clusters from the branches, I would take a broken branch and jump up and down to knock them down. I remember this being a lot of fun. I feel sorry for children these days who don’t grow up in the countryside and don’t experience this kind of enjoyment.

       The birds flying free in the sky were also objects of my curiosity. Once in a while some particularly pretty birds would come by, and I would study everything I could about them, noticing what the male looked like and what the female looked like. There were no books back then to tell me about the various kinds of trees, shrubs, and birds, so I had to examine each myself. Often I would miss my meals because I would be hiking around the mountains looking for the places where migratory birds went.

       Once I climbed up and down a tree every morning and evening for several days to check on a magpie nest. I wanted to see how a magpie lays its eggs. I finally got to witness the magpie lay its eggs, and I became friends with the bird as well. The first few times it saw me, the magpie let out a loud squawk and made a big fuss when it saw me approach. Later, though, I could get close and it would remain still.