Since I began my career
as a photojournalist in 1986, I have been growing this sense deeply while covering
wars and environmental destruction, learning of the lives of those who are affected
with diseases, and seeing the trials faced by people who are struggling to put
troubled pasts behind them.
Through my books, and through this website, I would like to show you the efforts
of people who are seeking to learn what we can do to live in harmony. Here you
will find healing gardens for the sick and disabled, community gardens that revive
communities, the power of human-animal bonding for emotionally injured children
and adults, art in medicine, the creative wisdom of those challenged with life-threatening
diseases, and much more.
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| Atsuko
Otsuka |
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Girls Who Raise Service Dogs
– Dog Program That Opens Hardened Heart
Kodansha Ltd., Publishers, 2012
Yen 1,300 (Japanese) |
| At-risk teenage girls at a juvenile facility in California participate in a service dog training program which gives them invaluable life lessons. They learn to be patient, responsible and compassionate through caring for the dogs they train. In return, the dogs give them the kind of unconditional love which helps open their hardened hearts, and helps establish their self-esteem.
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Mine Detection Dogs at Work
Kodansha Ltd., Publishers, 2011
Yen 580 (Japanese) |
| In the summer of 2007 I met two puppies in Bosnia and Herzegovina who were being trained to become mine detection dogs. After they completed their training I followed them to Cambodia, where they were sent to work in the mine fields. This is a four-year documentary for young people about the work of those mine detection dogs, and about the Cambodian people’s effort to demine and restore their war-torn land, and ultimately, to reclaim their country.
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Rebuilding Peaceful Community Through Gardening
Community garden project in Bosnia and Herzegovina
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