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[applause]

[cheers and applause] >> the san francisco boys chorus. [cheers and applause]

>> good evening. i am the visit -- executive director of rainbow -- rainbow world fund. welcome to the sixth annual world tree of hope tree lighting party. [applause] thank you. for those of you are not familiar with rainbow world fund, we're international humanitarian aid agency based in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. we work within our community to educate people about issues of world need in humanitarian aid. as we raise our communities consciousness, we raise funds to support committed the relief efforts and development projects around the world. we are gay and straight people coming together to heal the

world. our work good -- work focuses on when my new medication, hunter, safe drinking water act says, global hiv, and disaster relief. we have projects that we support in cambodia, haiti, honduras, guatemala, south africa, we have also worked to help with a number of humanitarian aid disasters around the world, such as the tsunami in southeast asia a few years ago, hurricane katrina, and burst recently, we held out with the earthquake and tsunami that hit northern japan in march but this year, we're dedicating the tree to the victims and survivors of that disaster. [applause] over the last 11 years, rainbow world fund has distributed $3.2

million in humanitarian aid on behalf of the lgbt and friends community. besides distributing humanitarian aid, we worked to inspire hope in our projects around the world, and we have come to learn that is equally important, if not more so, to foster a spirit of hope in people's lives. i have always believed that hope is the most important energy in the world. we have seen people living in the most desperate circumstances with very little resources, making positive changes in their lives with just a little support. the support that rainbow world fund gives creates hope in people's lives just by letting them know that someone cares about them. that alone is very powerful. we decided six years ago that we needed to inspire hope in the

united states, so we decided to create a global art project called the world tree of hope. the tree behind me is covered with 7000 pieces of origami, the majority of which are cranes. all of the cranes that someone's wishes for the world written on them. wishes are sent to us by snail mail and through the internet. we designed a project so that through the internet, anyone in the world can help decorate the tree by sending in a wage. and we create the tree as a global symbol of unity and as a gift from the world to the lgbt community. we are adding crane wishes throughout the month of december, so please send us your wish for the world if you have not already done so. we have another gift for you tonight. our volunteers have been distributing friendship bracelets from guatemala. we take the ball on a humanitarian aid for of

guatemala every year, and when we come back, we bring back a lot of friendship bracelets to spread the spirit of love from guatemala to the people of united states. we ask that you accept these in the spirit of rainbow world fund's philosophy, and that is that we're all one human family. we ask that you wear the bracelet as a symbol of solidarity with the core of the world. without further ado, i would like to introduce mayor ed lee of san francisco. [applause] >> thank you. thank you, jeff. welcome, everyone. welcome to our season of celebration but i am so delighted to be here tonight. anita and i to join all of you.

i see supervisor winner here. supervisor cohen, fresh from china. our treasure, thank you for being here. thank you for joining us. all of you, for joining us tonight, i really appreciate you coming here to our city hall to really get a community blessing to our tree of hope. this is our sixth year, as jeff stated, and it is one that i have the very personal pleasure of doing this for the first time as your elected mayor. thank you very much for joining us. [applause] this tree of hope has been very special to me, as i have, in the past, participated with good friends like jedd and karen and so many of the hundreds of volunteers over the years who put this petraeus " together. as -- to put this tree together.

as he said, all of you are welcome to submit your wishes as to how we can become a better city, better state, better world for everybody. it is quite appropriate that we join so many friends who have been here for years to have done this, people like donna and peter, rita, linda, veronica, and josh, all of you who have been here for many years to join us in putting this tree up and making is so meaningful. there are over 7000 wishes that we have on on this tree in the past, and we want to exceed that. we know, and it has been significant that the world rainbow fund it exists not only here in san francisco, but is significantly house owlet -- in our lgbt queue community center, and that they have represented

such commitment to make sure that we become a more tolerant and more expressive city and a more diverse city. i want to also thank the great choir that you just heard today, our san francisco boys choir. wasn't that a wonderful presentation from them? [applause] and later on, we will be hearing from our chinese american international school chorus. thank you for being here, case. [applause] we will also be joined by our sisters of perpetual indulgence. thank you very much for joining us here today as well. [applause] i also want to extend to all of you, tonight is not the only night that you get to help us celebrate these wonderful holidays that are up and coming, but on at the weekend of

december 17 and december 18, we will also be opening up our snow village right outside of city hall at civic center. we will be bringing in the real snow and to have our kids fill this wonderful place and experience that, and also on sunday, december 18, we will be continuing our season of giving. please, if you may, you're invited here to join us in the afternoon from 11 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., and bring a can of food to help share and help our needy. at the same time, i will be here to help take pictures and enjoy that. if you have not taken a picture of me yet, this is the time, to take it with you. we will be doing that tonight as well. i have an even and i will be leaving for shortly, but i will be coming right back here to enjoy the evening with you, and hopefully with our lights on on

our new tree of hope. i also want to extend a very warm welcome to our honorable hiroshi, our council general of japan to please come forward. i would like to present an exchange at this time, our cranes, which are messages of hope, and as jeff said earlier, at this year there is a special message we want to deliver, one i have personally been involved in, and i wanted our counsel general from japan to be here, to which not only the council general but to the people of japan all of our great wishes as they recover from the very devastating earthquake and tsunami in japan, and that this is an appropriate time to get that exchange. and if i may, i would like to present the council general this message of hope and our cranes. [applause]

>> good evening, ladies and gentlemen. thank you, mayor ed lee. actually, this is my second time to take part in the city of hope celebration. i would really like to extend my thanks to reno world fund and the mayor and the people who are coming to join today's celebration. so many things come to mind when we approach the idea of hope. some of the first that strike me our hope during troubled times and hope for the future. and all time hoped-for our societies, for our children, and for the world. everyone of us might have hope that the time of the beginning

of this year to see a better world to live in, more peaceful, more prosperous, more cheerful. but as he mentioned, we did have many, many large scale natural disasters this year, starting with the puree -- in penury and in march 11 in japan. here in the united states, we have many tornadoes and flooding and cyclones, wildfires. in bangkok, thailand, again, floodings. to the contrary, in east africa, drought and famine. so i would like to extend my sincere condolences and sympathy to the victims of all those natural disasters.

we talk about march 11, at the tsunami and the nuclear power accident. japan has faced tremendous difficulties. but with your compassion and support and encouragement, japan is now on the the way to recovery and reconstruction. [applause] thank you very much. thank you. with your determination and prayers, and again, support and friendship and from you, we will overcome this tremendous difficulty. thank you is again for your help, and thank you. [applause] i would like to extend my gratitude to the mayor. thank you.

>> what a beautiful tree, and while we have the children gathering, i want to read one of the minute -- many wishes we got on the origami. it says i wish for a world for our children more just, more fair, and more kind than the one we know now, president barack obama. [applause] i think they're just about gathered. you will tell me when. this is the chinese-american school choir. let's hear it for them. [

trucks [singing in foreign language]

[cheers and applause] [children singing] >> let's hear it for them, the chinese american school choir. talent comes in all kinds of packages.

thank you, kids. i want to thank those who have contributed to the dinner you will be enjoying later. we have hot cookie from the castro donating and sweet cookies for as. we also have lucky o'toole's restaurants and sushi yakitori restaurant. and barefoot winery is providing refreshments for us as they have for the last six years. so, enjoy those wonderful streets. they donated this wonderful tree as they have for the last five years for city hall and the world tree of pope. let's hear it for them.

i have a feeling that part of the size of today's crowd, because they are special guests, it is my honor and the rainbow world fund's honor to welcome writer, director, award winner peter coyote. [applause] >> boy, san francisco knows how to throw a party, doesn't it? i want to invite my young friend up. we are going to read some of the wishes in at these origami cranes. please welcome from the japanese community youth council -- [applause] >> i wish there was not any global warming.

>> i dare to wish for a world in which people live in harmony with each other and with the natural world and with all the wondrous animals with whom we share the planet. dame jane goodall. [applause] >> i wish for a world where all people are treated with dignity, respect, and equality, no matter who you are or who you love. from secretary of state hillary clinton. [applause] >> i wish for everyone to learn to love without war. from gloria iverson, 90 years old, the philippine islands. [applause] >> i wish it will snow in the morning so nobody has to go to school for two weeks. from michael, 13 years old, long island, new york. [laughter]

>> i wish that the women and children of iraq and afghanistan could grow up and exist without fear of violence, brutality, and death at every corner, without hunger, without poverty, but instead with freedom. anonymous. [applause] >> i wish that my mom's and all same-sex couples were afforded the basic human right of marriage and in turn given the legal rights needed so that we could become citizens. i wish we did not have to struggle together as a family, fighting together to remain a family. i wish we could live, work, and be just like every other family. from marina. >> and this is a little boy i want to meet. i wish that the next time i

leave it shadow and sadie my dogs in the backyard when we leave somewhere that they would dig out of the yard and run far, far away, but i wish that only a shadow would come back and not sadie. i wish that sadie was stolen off the street and sold. [laughter] wolfgang, age 12, sparks, nev.. >> say thank you to kira shira. i have been asked to stay just a couple of words about hope. i do not want to take a lot of time. it is something worth talking about, especially in times in which we could cautiously remark about the dark. wars, a lot of turmoil, a lot of struggle. some people think about hope as a wish. i wish i get a new bike for

christmas. i hope this, i hope that happens. actually it is quite powerful and there is a rational reason for believing in hope. will we think about the situation that we would like to say, there are only three things that could happen. it could be all the way we want. to go in a way that we do not care about, or eight ago negatively. so, when we talk about hope, if we say, well, i really want this to happen and i want to contribute my energy to making this happen, the hope is actually the energy that will get this out and commit us to doing this, because it is hope that will make us feel happy. it is hope that will make us feel curious about the outcome, it is hoped that will make us feel eager to put our shoulders to the wheel. we all know what it is like when you're depressed. so, living without hope really texas out of the picture.

then not only are we not trying or contributing, but we are not modeling that behavior for other people. so, when we are hopeful, it is based on one very simple, logical fact, which is that we do not know how things are going to turn now. never know that, no matter how bad things appear. since we do not know how that are going to turn out, we might as low they will have some effect. if we are hopeful, we will be positive. if we are positive, we will be energetic. we will be taking concrete steps to make the world the way we wanted and to model it for others to see. if we do that and enough people see us and follow us, we will be living in the world we want to live in. thank you so much. [applause] >> i do not know about you, but

i could listen to that voice for a long time. thank you, peter coyote. his first time here to visit us for lighting the tree. next, i would like to introduce to you and origami artist. she is known all over the world. she has an american flight currently displayed in the smithsonian museum. she started folding origami at the age of 5. please welcome linda mahara. >> thank you. is this one working? good evening. thank you for that wonderful introduction. thank you to ed lee. this is such a wonderful event. it does become a wonderful event for us. i would like to introduce my sister, linda avery, who is also an origami artist.

we got a call from the director jeff carter. he had a wonderful idea. we had the opportunity to do it in city hall. because we're known for origami work, we became kind of like the directors in helping get the project started. now it is here, and it has grown. it is the world tree of pope. i do not know if any of you know this, but last year, the tree was named one of the top 10 most beautiful trees by american express traveler. the word is getting out about history, filled with wonderful wishes. we were asked to say a few words about why origami and why trees. i will turn it over to my sister. >> the inspiration for the origami crane, the cream is a symbol of water life and happiness in japan -- the crane is a symbol of water life and

happiness in japan. when a woman was dying of leukemia after the bomb dropped in hiroshima, she created the crane as a symbol of peace. the symbol has resonated with so many people. we've got a lot of people to come in and write wishes and put them on the crane. there are over 7000 cranes on the tree, 13,000 stars to add some more sparkle and help with the wishes up to the heavens. so, we are really grateful we have the ability to create this gift for the city of san francisco. we would like to thank everybody who helped us. there are some many people. a lot of kids in the city of san francisco. that is pretty much it. thank you. thank you for coming.