Learning to Bow

Learning to Bow: Inside the Heart of Japan by Bruce Feiler


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Learning to Bow is Bruce Feiler's entertaining account of his year teaching English in Japan.  Having just returned from a year in Asia myself, it was easy to relate to his culture shock stories.  Learning to Bow also contains very interesting discussions of the Japanese education system and the difference between it and the American one.  Clearly there are ways in which Japan could stand to learn from us.  Equally clearly, we could profitable take some lessons from Japan.

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14 Cows for America

14 Cows for America by Carmen Agra Deedy


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This exquisitely illustrated picture book is a heart-warming (the more so because it is true) tale of a young Massai man who felt driven to do something to comfort the American people in the wake of September 11.  He tells his village elders what has happened and they, too, want to help.  And that is how the people of the United States come to possess a small herd of blessed Kenyan cattle still cared for on our behalf by the same remote village of Massai.  We all should learn from the generosity of these people half a world away who offered what they could to help people they'd never met in a place they could scarcely imagine.

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Half the Sky

Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas D. Kristof


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Half the Sky is simultaneously heartbreaking and inspiring.  Using the stories of remarkable women he has met around the world, Nicholas Kristof makes an impassioned plea for us to open our eyes, get engaged and take meaningful action to improve the plight of women everywhere.  The women Kristof profiles have been gang-raped, beaten, mutilated, sold into sexual slavery, often targeted by the very police, governments and other authority figures who should have been protecting them - even by other women.  But some of them have also overcome overwhelming odds to rescue themselves and to fight to help other women.  Kristof argues convincingly that "women's issues" are really people issues - that everyone benefits when women are safe, educated and productive.  He calls for us to get engaged - to step outside the safety of our homes and witness what too much of the world sees every day and to get involved.  Half the Sky should be required reading for everyone, everywhere and we should heed its call.

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What the Dog Saw

What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures by Malcolm Gladwell


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures is a wonderful collection of (author: Malcolm Gladwell]'s New Yorker columns spanning more than a decade.  Gladwell tackles an enormous range of topics, each in an engaging and thought provoking way.  It never, for example, would have occurred to me that I might be drawn in to an essay on women's hair dye.  Gladwell, however, uses the topic as a springboard to explore how women's roles in society have shifted over the past half century and the interrelationship between advertising and culture.  Fascinating!

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