CULTURE

Hemispheres — Sichuan Fairy Tale
”Li Ziqi’s projects are anti-convenience, the opposite of the Instant Pot meals and life hacks the internet celebrates. Her fans tune in to wind down after a long day—ironically, by taking in a glamorized version of labor whose fruits you can actually taste.”

Atlas Obscura — Street Musicians Have Turned Mexico City Into One Giant Music Venue
“‘The bigger pandemic is hunger.’”

Borderless Magazine — ‘Reverse Assimilation’ Podcast Unpacks What it Means to be Mexican-American
”I became a ‘good American’ — whatever that means — and I became a ‘bad Mexican.’”

Virgin Australia — Mexico City in a Basket
”When the man who sells produce outside my apartment every week slips a rose into my basket and calls my dog by name, it’s a reminder for visitors both short- and long-term: there’s a unique opportunity for connection beyond consumption.”

Inside Out — How Norigae Evolved From Fashion Accessory to Tattoo in South Korea
”The norigae reminds me that a woman can be both delicate and passionate, and this duality does not take away from her character.”

Atlas Obscura — The Cucumber Horses and Eggplant Cows That Welcome Back the Dead
”The cucumber horse is long and sleek, symbolizing ancestors’ swift journeys home to their families. The eggplant cow, plump and sturdy, embodies ancestors’ leisurely return trip, a load of souvenirs with them in tow.”

Curiosity — Why Do We Break Up In Restaurants?
“I broke up with someone a few months ago at Ruby Foo’s in the Upper West Side… it was great.”

Broccoli  — Wax Poetic: Mexican candle making at the intersection of tradition and ephemerality
"Somewhere in the rococo mass of flora and filigree, there's a wick."

Broccoli — True Colors: Mood Rings as Chromatic Indexes for the Soul
"We're chasing simple paths to self-knowledge."

Curiosity Magazine — Why Do We Break Up In Restaurants?
“I broke up with someone a few months ago at Ruby Foo’s in the Upper West Side… it was great.”

Roads & Kingdoms — Waste Not, Want Not: An abandoned elementary school becomes a shrine to the concept of mottainai
"'The day after they eat at Saizen they will have a good, healthy poo.'"

i-D — Akihide Nakachi: Meet the Japanese designer who makes clothes for twinning
"We often think of fashion as being about expressing one’s individuality, but you are (were) here speaks to the tension between wanting to be an individual and wanting to belong to a group."

i-D — Quiero Ver Como Tú Ves: These Mexico City artists swapped lives for an entire month
”It was like spying on someone who knows they’re being spied on and at the same time is spying on you — and you know it, and you let it happen.”

Travel Portland — Safe Spaces for Cannabis Consumption in Portland
"'If women are still in their bedrooms smoking by themselves, that doesn’t facilitate the forward growth of the cannabis movement.'"

Matador Network — How Will Christians and Muslim Coexist in the New Egypt?
"A self-described atheist in a country where people don’t describe themselves as atheists."

Matador Network — The Egyptian Revolution, Reflected in Cairo's Date Market
"'A tourist is watching!' he says, elbowing the others. 'My god, what a scandal!'"

Refinery29 — Japan's "Genderless Kei" Trend Is About So Much More Than Just Fashion
"The Genderless Kei starter pack would include: a ‘90s Devon Sawa ‘do, dewy skin so white it glows, platform shoes, eye-popping color contacts, Instagrammable nail art, a mini backpack, and all things pink."

Refinery29 — That Time My Husband & I Stayed At A Japanese Love Hotel
"A deeper probe into the cabinets revealed a glowing sex toy vending machine."

Refinery29 — Why Hot Guys In Japan Visit Offices To Wipe Women's Tears
"Even scary bosses have unexpectedly cute crying faces.”

Refinery29 — Why You Need To Start Making Your Own Bento Lunch
"Like Lunchables for the gastronome — think teeny morsels Tetris’d together to create a portable collage of nourishment."

Refinery29 — Japanese Wedding Rituals Are A Little Bit Different
"In place of a veil goes one of two types of oversized white hoods: the wataboshi and the Tsunokakushi, which symbolically covers the wife-to-be’s “horns of jealousy” on her big day."

Refinery29 — I Went to a Hedgehog Cafe in Tokyo
"Suddenly the café’s abundance of hand sanitizer made sense."

Refinery29 — Is This What Manicures Will Look Like In The Future?
"'What if this pattern on the nail moved freely, changing forms depending on the person’s feeling and emotion?’"

Refinery29 — The Japanese Coffee Innovation That America Needs ASAP
"Your caffeine addiction could be getting a lot more convenient."

ESSAYS

Perfect Strangers — A Cultural Outsider Draws Connections Between Festivals of the Dead in Mexico and Japan
"The collective performance of bringing deceased loved ones home once a year, of affirming that they do in some way live on, seems to me deeply cathartic."

Curbed — I Lived in a Tokyo Coworking Space
”I gave up on professionalism and slipped into oversharing the messier parts of life that I usually don’t put on display for coworkers—being hungover, braless, binge-watching Terrace House.”

The Changing Times — Wherever We Live, We Live Together 
"Being earthquake drunk is like when you spend the day swimming in the ocean and at night, dry in your bed, you still feel your body dragged by the waves."

Racked — I'm Tired of Justifying My Armpit Hair
"Something old, something new, something borrowed, something hairy."

PROFILES & INTERVIEWS

Lenny Letter — The Love Witch Filmmaker Anna Biller
“I’m a freak, I’m a witch... I’m just a female.”

Apiece Apart Woman — Elisabeth Prueitt
”I’m a shy person who has for some reason chosen to do very public things.”

Apiece Apart Woman — Agnes Baddoo
”You know that that Diana Vreeland code, “The eye has to travel”? For me, it's like the eye has to rest. It's about pacing. It's the same with music; I'm much more into a one-note solo with a lot of space in between it than I am a mindless marathon of noodling up and down the fretboard.”

Apiece Apart Woman — Samhita Mukhopadhyay
”In many ways, I feel like I wrote myself into existence.”

Portland Monthly — For 35 Years, This Hidden Portland Shop Has Imported Buddhist Shrines from Japan
”Inside Excalibur Comics, tucked behind a secret door, is a portal to Japan. There, a small, hushed space, packed as neatly as a bento box, is Nakayama Butsudans.”

Travel Portland — Young, Gifted and Brown fosters community through dance in Portland
"'When you say ‘healing space,’ a lot of folks think of a therapy room or a spa. But dancing together to beats that have been deeply ingrained in our humanity is healing.'"

Broccoli — Holy Rollers
"Brother-sister duo Sundae School creates unisex smokewear, slipping stoner Easter eggs into traditional Korean motifs with the goal of bringing Asian Americans into the countercultural conversation."

October — Fido’s, the 'World's First Dog Tap House'
”Porter gently separates Alfons, a.k.a. Alfie—a humper—from Dora, an independent woman who is still wearing diapers after getting fixed.”

October — Brewer Lee Hedgmon Learned the Rules in Order to Break Them
”A distiller barrel-aged in academia.” 

Refinery29 — Ebony Bizys of Hello Sandwich
"A Former Vogue Staffer's Guide To Tokyo"

LISTS

Ozy — 7 Must-Read Female Voices From Japan
"Because there’s more to Japanese literature than Murakami."

Ozy — The Best Way to Fetishize Food, Japanese-Style
"From a love scene involving live shrimp to an elderly fruit fondler, Tampopo takes food porn to a PG-13 level."

Refinery29 — 5 Kind-Of-Strange Things About Going To The Bathroom In Japan
"Japanese attempts to drown out the toots of noblemen date back to the Edo period."

Portland Mercury — Eat This! Where to Find Portland’s Best Onigiri
"Vegan spam is a mystery meat I couldn't resist investigating."

Portland Mercury  — The Jell-O Shot Mega List: The Best Bars for Gettin' Jiggly With It
"Me: 'What flavors of Jell-O shots do you have?' Him: 'Red.'"

Mental Floss — 19 Must-Visit Stops on Mexico City's Metro
"It’s both the journey and the destination."

Mental Floss — 15 Japanese Food Onomatopoeias
"Puri-puri, pari-pari, pori-pori."

Mental Floss — 9 Ways Japanese Schools Are Different From American Schools
"Sorry ladies, there’s no pants option."

Mental Floss — Happy Meat Day! And Other Japanese Pun Holidays You Didn’t Know You Were Missing
"Ichigo No Hi (Strawberry Day) is also a day for cheering on these members of the so-called 'Strawberry Generation' (overprotected youth who bruise easily, like their namesake)"