Imagine All the People… Living Life in Peace. by Cheryl Esposito

Jerilyn is founder of PeaceTable and co-founder of PeaceTrees Vietnam. Her story begins in her grandmother’s kitchen and takes her globetrotting in the spirit of peace and diplomacy. She founded PeaceTable as a tool for building cultural understanding, by creating shared culinary experiences between people of the United States and the former Soviet Republics. Her citizen diplomacy did not stop there. In 1995, she co-founded PeaceTrees Vietnam, a humanitarian organization that sponsors the removal of land mines and sends volunteers to plant trees and build homes in their place. In Quang Tri Province, Vietnam, PeaceTrees volunteers have planted 43,400 indigenous trees and built homes in their place with local families. Jerilyn’s compassion has inspired a world of difference.