{Guest post By Idan Ravin} I wrote It Takes Patience, with the hope it inspires children to find their ‘voice', adults to rekindle their past and soak in the nostalgia, and families to connect meaningfully during these challenging times. The story is told through the eyes of seven-year-old Patience, multiracial and living in a small town in Appalachia, as she learns resilience,...
Deedee Cummings has been a long-time supporter of Multicultural Children's Book Day, and as the years tick forward, we continue to be blown away by the talent, passion, and tenacity of this multi-book diverse author. Her business, Make a Way Media, offers everything from workshops to journals to inspire creativity in kids; creativity founded in writing...
May is Asian-American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in the United States. The month of May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese to the United States on May 7, 1843, and to mark the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869. The majority of the workers...
Guest post by Dr.Stephanie Oguchi
As I sit here thinking about how I want to share my childhood memories to the public, I can’t help but to daydream about how I got this far, as a Nigerian American Doctor of Occupational Therapy from the big city of Houston Texas, who was bullied because of my differences as a child. As an adult, I should’ve been scared of the world, not open to change and redirect any attention off of myself due to fear of rejection. However, I actually thank the boy who made fun of my differences because it triggered emotions that allowed me to tap into my inner strengths and learn to control my fears, ambition and leadership qualities.
When I was a kid in the 80’s I really didn’t know about any other culture, except mine, which was the Nigerian culture. I knew my family ate a lot of fish, rice and moi moi (an authentic Nigerian dish derived from beans). My parents would dress in their traditional Nigerian clothes, my mom would thread my hair during the summertime, and Nigerian parties lasted till 4 am; which was all normal.
One day, my culture was suddenly seen as “abnormal.” My threaded hairstyle was no longer a normal hairstyle, according to the American kids on the bus. It was the butt of jokes and ridicule which really bothered me as a kid. I told my mom to take out the thread in my hair, which was an easy decision to make as a kid. I was vulnerable and didn’t want to be harassed. I conformed to a “ normal” hairstyle of braids with barrettes to appease the other kids and to eliminate the negative and unwanted attention that was given to me.
Now as I think about it as an adult, I kick myself for conforming to everyone else’s “norm” rather than they conform to my “norm”.
guest post from author, Danual Berkley After getting out of the military, I self-published my first book Wonderful Magical Place. I did not know anything about publishing and marketing, so it didn’t do too well. I eventually gave up writing for several years until my wife encouraged me to get back into it. She thought it...