Julia Hill Lives in a Tree

Voice 1
Welcome to Spotlight. Im Bruce Gulland.

Voice 2
And Im Liz Waid. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for
people to understand, no matter where in the world they live.

Voice 1
On December 10, 1997, Julia Butterfly Hill climbed into a tree. She did not come down for two
years. She ate in the tree. She slept in the tree. She became the tree's protector. But why
would Hill do this? And what made her finally come down? Todays Spotlight is on Julia
Butterfly Hill and her work for the environment.

Voice 3
"I never thought that I was going to live in a tree. If I had seen what was coming, I would have
gone screaming in the other direction. But life does not give it to us that way. Life just gives it to
us moment by moment, day by day. We show up and live it the best that we can."

Voice 2
Julia Butterfly Hill said these words during a conference in Washington. She told a large group
of people about how she became an environmental activist. Environmental activists work to
protect the earth. They believe that people should protect all plants and animals. But Hill did not
always care about these things.

Voice 1
At the age of 16 Hill quit school and worked at a restaurant. For many years, she was only
interested in making money and material things. Then one day she had a serious car accident.
It changed her life. Hill told the magazine Grist what happened:

Voice 3
I had a car wreck in August of 1996. I was driving my friends car. We were hit from behind by
a drunk driver. It took 10 months of physical and brain therapy to recover from the wreck.
During that time, I realized I wanted to find a more powerful purpose for being here on this
planet.

Voice 2
As soon as her body healed, Hill travelled to the west of the United States. There she saw an
amazing sight - the ancient redwood trees of California. These trees are reddish brown in
colour. Many of them are thousands of years old. But what is most amazing is their size;
redwood trees can grow up to 120 metres high. And they can be up to 8 metres across. These
giant redwoods are the largest trees in the whole world.

Voice 1
The wood from redwood trunks is very hard. This wood makes strong building structures such
as parts of railroads and buildings. So logging companies cut down many of the giant
redwoods to use for construction. There are not many forests of these trees left. Many
environmental activists want to protect the remaining trees. The redwoods are very important to
the environment.

Voice 2
In 1997 a group called Earth First was working to protect a particular group of trees. They were
negotiating with the logging company but they needed more time. They decided to send
someone up into a redwood tree. They hoped this would stop the company from cutting the
trees down. Julia Butterfly Hill volunteered. She wanted to go up in the tree. She tells reporter
Judith Fertig about the day she went up into the tree. She named it Luna.

Voice 3
On December 10, 1997, I put on the belt and ropes and went up into Luna. It was 55 metres
up. I thought it would be three or four weeks in the tree. But it turned into two years and eight
days. I returned to the ground only after the company agreed to protect Luna and the
surrounding wooded area.

Voice 1
Julia Hill lived in the tree for over two years without ever coming down. She learned to survive
in this difficult environment. She walked barefoot on the tree branches. She never washed the
sticky sap from the tree off of her feet. It helped her to walk on the tree branches. Hill built two
small platforms to live on. She had a large piece of plastic material to protect her. But she was
never comfortable. It is always cold and wet in a redwood tree. There were even very serious
winter storms while Hill was in the tree. The wind and cold almost knocked Hill out of the tree.
But she did not fall - she survived.

Voice 2
Hill cooked her food with a small stove. Her friends visited her two times every week. They sent
what Hill needed up through a pulley system of ropes. Once, they even sent her a chocolate
birthday cake! But most of the time, it was very difficult and lonely to live in a tree.

Voice 1
Finally, after years of arguing, the logging company decided to protect Luna. They signed an
agreement to never cut down this giant redwood tree or the trees around it. When Hill put her
feet on the earth, she began to cry. But from that moment Hill has continued her work to protect
the environment. People around the world want to meet her and hear her story. Hill uses her
fame to encourage people to work for the environment in their own communities. She told the
San Francisco Chronicle:

Voice 3
Everywhere I go to talk about my experiences, I relate it with what is happening locally. I hope
to get the general public listening, the ones who want to see the woman who sat in the tree for
two years."

Voice 2
Since her time in the redwood tree, Hill has done other kinds of environmental activism. She
even had to leave the country of Ecuador. She was supporting indigenous people in their
protests against mining companies. Hill works with many different groups. But she still lives a
very simple life. She does not eat any products made from animals. She does not use things
that create waste when they are thrown away. And Hill encourages other people to do these
things also. She told the conference in Washington:

Voice 3
We live in a world that is full of problems. And we are the solutions to those problems. After I
came down from living in that tree, I started realizing how every moment we make choices.
Every single choice changes the world - every single one of them. Every moment of every day
we are looking for ways to be living examples of all that is beautiful and humble and just and
amazing about our world."

Voice 1
The writer of this program was Rena Dam. The producer was Luke Haley. The voices you
heard were from the United Kingdom and the United States. All quotes were adapted for this
program and voiced by Spotlight. You can listen to this program again, and read it, on the
internet at www.radioenglish.net. This program is called, Julia Hill Lives in a Tree.

Voice 2
You can also leave your comments on our website. Or you can email us at
radio@radioenglish.net. You can also find us on Facebook - just search for spotlightradio. We
hope you can join us again for the next Spotlight program. Goodbye

Question:
What would you do to protect something important to you? Would you do anything extreme?