This past Sunday, I was asked to present the children’s portion of our worship service. I decided to share one of Simbolei’s best of the year picture book selections, Saturday by Oge Mora.

Saturday is the story of Ava and her mother, who fill every Saturday with special activities. On one particular Saturday, however, every planned activity results in disappointment. The library storytime is canceled, the park is crowded and so on. As Ava and her mother bounce back from each disappointment, the text repeats a coping technique. Ava and her mother take a deep breath “whew” and the mother repeats, “Today will be special. Today will be splendid. Today is Saturday.” In the end, despite repeated disappointments, the day is splendid as Ava and her mother recognize that being together is what makes the day truly special.

This book meets all the criteria we use to choose our best picture book selections. The text is clear, understandable and enjoyable to read for both adults and children. The artwork is gorgeous, using multimedia collage to create a sense of movement and excitement. The characters are people of color, allowing children of all races to feel validated and recognized in the story. And finally, while the story is simple, it touches on deeper themes and ideas.

When I read the book to the children in worship, they were enthralled. I asked them if they could relate to the idea of having a plan for something fun and exciting that turned out to be disappointing. One little boy mentioned that sometimes we wait and wait for snow to come and when it does, it gets in our mouth! What a disappointment!

Picture books are more than entertainment and they are more than an exercise in reading. Through art and carefully crafted text, a high quality picture book functions as more complex fiction does for adults, as a mirror and an exploration of the world around them. When children identify with the feelings and experiences of fictional characters, they are learning to empathize and to see feelings and ideas in symbolic terms. They are entering the literary traditions of human culture. To me, it is a great honor to be part of this process as a teacher and as a literacy volunteer through Simbolei’s literacy outreach programs.

Saturday and our other yearly selections will be available for purchase at the Lansing Peace Education Center Alternative Holiday Sale November 15 and 16 at Edgewood United Church and also at the Presbyterian Church of Okemos Alternative Christmas Gift Sale on December 8 at Presbyterian Church of Okemos. Simbolei receives 30% of the purchase price of each book. If you would like to purchase any of these books but cannot attend the sales, please send us an email at simboleigirls@gmail.com and we can arrange to mail the books to you. Happy book shopping!

Posted on November 11, 2019

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So, lots of updates are in order. Due to family responsibilities, the Kaitanys were not able to relocate in July as planned. Currently, Richard is travelling back and forth between Michigan and Kenya every few months to keep things moving in both places. Our house is on the market and our shipping boxes are neatly packed and labeled. It won’t be long before ALL of us have a new home in Kenya.

But in the meantime, the holidays are approaching and that means time for some great new books for the Simbolei Library and for folks who visit us at holiday gift fairs.

Every year, I choose a few of the many amazing picture books that come out each year to suggest for holiday gift giving and for our Simbolei Library. My criteria include choosing new books by diverse authors and featuring children from a variety of ethnic, cultural, social and religious backgrounds that promote positive values. Also, I look for books with outstanding artwork. There are always too many amazing choices. But, I try to limit the list to five or six. So, without further ado, I introduce our first holiday book pick of 2019.

This recent bestseller tells the story of Katherine Johnson who loved numbers and counting. After overcoming many challenges, particularly gender and race discrimination, Katherine grew up to work with NASA as a “computer,” completing complex equations needed for space flight. When the Apollo 13 spacecraft was damaged while returning to earth, Katherine managed to recalculate a new flight path quickly and accurately, saving the lives of the three astronauts who were able to return safely to earth. The book has lively illustrations that create a continuity of Katherine’s character as she grows older through the story. Katherine’s story is first a story of personal courage and talent, but also includes reference to historical discrimination against black people and women in the United States and especially in the fields of math and science. Further, this book is unusual in providing brief, simple explanations of Katherine’s actual work with advanced mathematics and physics that could be an interesting conversation starter for a math or science classroom. The book is perfectly suited to a seven to nine year old reader on their own or, with some help and possibly slightly simplified read aloud, would fascinate most four to seven year olds.

I will have copies of the book ready for purchase at the Lansing Peace and Education Holiday sale on November 15 and 16 and at the Presbyterian Church of Okemos Alternative Holiday sale on December 8. Through the generosity of Schuler Books and Music, 30% of the purchase price at either of these sales will go directly to Simbolei Community Assistance to help fund our community library and other educational activities. If you would like to purchase a copy but are unable to attend the sales, please email me at simboleigirls@gmail.com and I can arrange to mail a copy to you.

Stay tuned for the rest of our holiday list over the next few days!

Posted on November 4, 2019

As I’m packing and preparing the Simbolei Community Library for shipment from Michigan to Kenya, one of the greatest challenges for me is the temptation to continue to purchase new books. I am trying to cut back on purchases so that I can get the books we already have ready for shipment and I can turn my attention to other moving related tasks that need to be done.

Having gotten that off my chest, I want to follow up on last week’s post about A Rope from the Sky, a recent history of South Sudan, with another Sudan related book in an entirely different genre.

Morning in Serra Mattu : A Nubian Ode is a collection of interrelated verse stories that describe the culture, environment and people of Nubia, an ancient civilization and now a region in the country of Sudan. This is a beautiful and intriguing book, the poetry full of delicate and intimate details while overall the poems weave the story of historical and environmental change.

Over 100,000 Nubian people in Egypt and Sudan were displaced upon completion of Egypt’s Aswan High Dam in 1960 and this event is one of the tragic themes of the stories. But, the history in this book reaches much farther back into the distant past as well as into the present.

Here is an excerpt from the poem With Alawiyya -

Alawiyya was your sister
one year older
with whom you loved to set out to explore
and together you knew all the roads
and hidden paths and complex secret passageways
of all those neighborhoods

sometimes climbing on roofs of garages
from which height you reached out with a wire
you bent with a hook to pull
tamarinds down toward you
taking in your hands the fruit

and the British were quite crazy with such sun
to grow every kind of citrus that they could

to water with each moon
they flooded the gardens from the Nile
the orchard then became a lake

from With Alawiyya in Morning in Serra Mattu

With books we can travel the world, finding our common feelings with people from other times and places but also learning to see the world through another person’s experiences. As we prepare to move the Simbolei Community Library into its new home , I find books to be both soothing and inspiring. I’ll continue to share treasures for adults and children, both books specifically related to Africa and books related to topics such as development and education so that you can share the journey of discovery with us.

Happy reading!

— Andrea

Posted on February 16, 2019

February is Black History Month in the US, so I thought it would be a good time to share some books about Africa and Black history that I have found interesting. Today, I’ll cover two very recent books, one for adults and one for younger readers that cover important aspects of Black history.

The first book is A Rope from the Sky : The Making and Unmaking of the World’s Newest State by Zach Vertin, which came out in January 2019. South Sudan, Kenya’s neighbor to the north, is one of the world’s newest countries, having separated from Sudan in 2011 and began to disintegrate in civil disputes in 2013. Vertin follows the major figures in the formation and eventual disruption of South Sudan as they achieve the impossible, separating from the country governed from Khartoum created by the British and setting up a new country. But, fighting for independence and governing a modern state are two different tasks requiring different strengths.

The picture of South Sudan’s struggles with corruption and the toxic manipulation of ethnic rivalries illustrates the struggles common to many African nations to one degree or another. The book is rather long but quite readable and helped me understand South Sudan and its impact on East Africa much better. Simbolei’s late friend and patron, Lazarus Sumbeiywo makes a brief appearance in the peace negotiation process.

For younger readers, Black History Month is a great time to learn about some stellar figures in science. One beautiful new picture book — The Vast Wonder of the World — tells the story of African American scientist, Ernest Everett Just, a pioneer in the study of cell biology. The pictures in this book are gorgeous and the text describes Just’s life and work in a way that will spark the interest of readers ages 6-11 in cell biology while also discussing the racial discrimination Just faced in his career. The book’s author is Melina Mangal and Luisa Uribe did the beautiful illustrations.

Over the years, many of you have asked me what types of books the Simbolei library will include. Others have asked what books might give good information about East Africa. As I pack up my own library and prepare to ship the books, I will be posting brief descriptions of some favorites here. Happy reading!

— Andrea

Posted on February 16, 2019