111 Trees: How One Village Celebrates the Birth of Every Girl

111 Trees: How One Village Celebrates the Birth of Every Girl is part of the “CitizenKid” series, a collection of books that inform children about the world and inspire them to be better global citizens. The focus of 111 Trees is gender inequality, and the book’s setting is Piplantri, a village in India. There, a man named Shyam Sundar Paliwal, called Sundar throughout the story, challenged the ancient tradition that only the birth of boys would be celebrated. Sundar grew up in Piplantri and understood the challenges the villagers faced; the well and access to water was a long walk away, and there were food shortages. Boys were celebrated because they would carry on the family name and take care of their parents as they aged. A girl was seen as a burden to the family because the parents would have to pay a dowry when the girl married.

When Sundar was a young boy, he was close with his mother and saw how she cried at night because there wasn’t enough food or space in their house for all her children. One day she died following a snake bite and the village mourned. Years later, Sundar married and had three children. He worked hard to teach his children respect for plants and animals because he recognized that people rely on the natural world for survival. After working at a local marble mine, Sundar quit because he had asked the factory owners to plant trees to repair the damage the mining was doing to the land and surrounding area, including his village, and the owners refused. Sundar then returned to his village and ran to become the village head because he had dreams for what the village could be, with no one going hungry or needing to walk for water and the land healing from the mining damage with the planting of trees.

A year after Sundar was elected as the village head, his daughter died from dehydration. While he was grieving, he planted some trees in her memory and draws three lines on the ground representing his daughter, water and trees. The number 111 stayed with him, and he worked hard to convince the people of the village that every time a girl was born, her birth would be celebrated by the planting of 111 trees. The villagers were initially resistant to the idea, but Sundar said he would plant the trees himself if the villagers promised to send their daughters to school and not marry them off before they were eighteen. As the trees grew, the villagers noticed that there was balance being brought back to nature. Sundar worked with engineers to dig trenches so the trees and people had water, and the women planted aloe vera to protect the trees from termites. The trees began to provide food for the community, and the village began to prosper as the new plants provided the women with an opportunity to make goods to sell. The girls went to school and learned along with the boys, and the new tradition of 111 trees being planted every time a girl is born continues.

111 Trees is an interesting and inspiring true story about challenging tradition and embracing the possibilities that can come with change. The story deals with gender inequality in a delicate and age-appropriate way. The story is a little bit dense as it covers several different aspects of gender inequality, like education, child marriage and division of labor, which can, at times, make the story complex. The end matter, consisting of four pages of text and colour photos of Sundar and his village, Piplantri, provides further information which fleshes out the book’s main text. Additionally, it provides an explanation of gender inequality and provides readers with a brief test to see if they are an Eco-Feminist. 111 Trees is really well-written and accessible, making it an appropriate choice for even young children.

Marianne Ferrer’s illustrations in the book are beautiful and colourful, making them highly engaging for children. In particular, the images depicting the village once the villagers have begun planting trees and gaining biodiversity are quite vibrant. 111 Trees would make a great addition to a personal collection or school library, and its content would also make an interesting subject for a school project or book report.