Special Addition: MNINB Blogroll

Folks are starting to send me links to free artwork, so I thought it best to re-explain my legal-pad/crayon theme. It is an homage to Not Bob and his lined-paper/magic-marker thumbnails.
This next group of Not Bobbers take on the wider-world from their unique perspectives. If I had to put Writing Space into one of my own categories, I would have placed it in this grouping. Whether a passport or a visa is needed to travel to the homes of these next bloggers or not, issues of cultural identity and heritage blend with the everyday aspects of their lives and writings. Here is your passport to adventures a mouse click away.

What will follow over the next week or so is an annotated blogroll. My space is limited, but I strive to give you a taste of what you are missing by not subscribing to these talented writers, poets, and artists.  I hope you love getting to know my fellow Not Bobbers as much as I have. Please share your thoughts here and on their blogs as well. We love feedback. Everyone of us.

Karen Pliskin Karen posts from Ferney-Voltaire, on the French side of the France-Switzerland border. Her latest adventure in blogging, CERN Wife, gives us a glimpse of everyday life of a spouse-in-tow as her physicist husband spends a year working at the famous CERN laboratory. Think Hadron Collider. Once a week or so we get a taste of modern French culture. I’ve been lobbying for a Trader Joe’s in Honolulu. It seems I should add Picard’s to that list. Karen is an academic in her own right with a book published by Yale Press, Silent Boundaries. La Sagesse is an older blogging endeavor, and one I find equally as fascinating.

Emily McGee Spouse-in-Tow. Emily has got that one down. Her newest blog, One Trailing Spouse, details the trials, tribulations and triumphs of those who follow along. She has the chops, she and her nameless hubby have moved six times in their five year marriage. She packs her blog like I pack a suitcase, full of useful items and spare on fluff. Her current series, Portable Jobs, ticks off the Where, How, Advantages, & Disadvantages for each highlighted career. A great source of adventure for the armchair traveler, but an even greater resource for the spouse-in-tow. Once a teacher, always a teacher.

Jennifer Chow  “An Asian-American writer exploring life through Chinese sayings,” Jennifer Chow is an up-dated fortune cookie, the medium and the metaphor she uses to explore a modern American interpretation of her Asian heritage. Her posts are spare, poetic, and profound. Just enough information to roll around in your imagination like a piece of hard candy, or Li Hing Mui Crack Seed! Food for thoughts.

Chido Muchemwa Speaks English, French and Shona, but does she speak Texan? This native of Zimbabwe attends university in Denton, Texas, where the hair is big and the make-up thick. At least it was the last time I drove through. But they have a Braum’s, so there is something sweet to savor. In fact there is more to savor at her blog site, chidochokuverenga, than Chido might realize. And an audience ready to hear her sing the song she was always meant to sing. Give this new writer some love and encouragement and we will all be the richer for it! Happy Birthday from a fellow May Day gal!

Caryl Zimmerman Another MNINBer who is a spouse-in-tow. While Karen has an academic-scientific flair and Emily has a distinctly NGO-ness about her, Caryl has a global corporate feel. Her latest post on A-Caryling, gives her take-off of the Real REAL Housewives meme. And her current locale? Calgary, AB, Canada. Armed with a Nikon D5100, she is bagging shots of suburban life as well as the wilder life of the Canadian Rockies.

Mariya Koleva When I think of Mariya, I think poetry. I’m not alone. She has an international fan club that has been following her through a few years of poetry challenges. When I check out my blog stats and see Bulgaria lit up on my map, I know she has been to visit. When I write my masterpiece, I know a professional that can do the Eastern European translations for me. We can dream. For now, I delight in her insight, her poems, and her challenges. And you can too. Visit her at Mariya Koleva’s Website to see her phoenix is rising, rising ever higher.

Bonus Section:

Sahaj Kaur Kohli Sahaj has a lot of things going on in her life. I’m sure I don’t know the half of it. She is a young, 20-something finding herself through her blogging, poetry, and her advocacy for others. She’s a voice to be reckoned with. Her newest blog, A Quarter Life Crisis, deals with the crises of being a quarter of a century old in the new millennium. Like my own daughters and many of their friends, Sahaj is a hyphenated American who draws strength from family connections here and abroad, but is mainly focused on the new global order. Her Ultimate Love Affair is a love affair with love poems, and her The Love Project, speaks to her cohorts, young-urban-educated-professionals from varied family backgrounds, on a subject that is universal, L-O-V-E.

Check out her interview on Blogtalkradio.

Miss a post in this series? Need to revisit a post? All are easy to access in the archives. Just hit the category tag for MNINB Blogroll to see what you are missing.