My friend Lori sent me this article about how the Native Hawaiian salt makers are protecting their sacred traditions. Kauai’s salt ponds are featured in my picture book, Food for the Future: Sustainable Farms Around the World. Here are some interesting excerpts from the article: “Nobrega-Olivera believes Hanapepe salt has the power to ward…
Looking for books with Filipino characters? Learn about the Philippines with these Filipino American children’s books, including Tagalog words! Mika Song and Isabel Roxas have teamed up to come up with Filipino and Filipino-American Children’s books which are few and far between. I only know one picture book, Cora Makes Pancit by Dorina K. Lazo Gilmore, illustrated…
School is out, and July is a slow month for children’s book list-related events, but here is what I have. 4th of July 6 Favorite Diverse Picture Books for 4th of July Here’s a video interview of Janet Wong on her inspiration behind writing Apple Pie Fourth of July: July 14th: Shark Awareness Day 22…
An idiom is a word or phrase where the meaning can’t be determined by individual words themselves. The meaning stems from an association with something else, such as a cultural reference. I wrote Boxer Baby Battles Bedtime! to showcase how many popular idioms have boxing origins that perhaps people don’t know about. But I also…
It was strange to me that many important Japanese American stories were not told by Japanese Americans. I tried, therefore, to focus my Top 10: Japanese American Children’s Books list on lesser known authors telling important stories. I hope this list will inspire more authors in this genre!
I chose these books because there was something special about each of them that helps me to connect to my Chinese roots and I hope that you enjoy them to, even if your ancestry isn’t Asian.
In the Netflix series, Taco Chronicles, the episode on basket tacos features Marven, the “Lady Tacos de Canasta,” a transgender taco vendor who identifies as ‘muxe’, the third Zapotec indigenous gender. She used her rise to fame from the show to fight against police harassment, using her experiences as an LGBTQIA+ street vendor to run…