I hope some day my kids coax me..

perch88

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/0 ... r=1&oref=slogin

YOON AND THE CHRISTMAS MITTEN
By Helen Recorvits. Illustrated by Gabi Swiatkowska.

Unpaged. Frances Foster Books/Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $16. (Ages 4 to 8)

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Yoon is a young Korean girl, maybe 6 or 7, whose family has recently moved to America. Her stylish pageboy and avid expressions first appeared three years ago, when Helen Recorvits and Gabi Swiatkowska teamed up for the lovely picture book “My Name Is Yoon.” In that story, Yoon’s parents had to coax her to write her name in English instead of Korean. Now, though, as she learns about Christmas American style, Yoon is dazzled. Visions of presents and tumbling elves dance in her head. She rushes home to report each new detail to Mother and Father: Santa Claus! The North Pole! Rudolph!

Her parents are less than thrilled. (You may suspect, looking at her father’s crossed arms and frowning puss, that his heart is two sizes too small.) “We are not a Christmas family,” her mother says. Her father pushes a holiday storybook away. “We are Korean,” he tells her. “Santa Claus is not our custom.”

So now it’s Yoon’s turn to coax. Mostly she goes about it the way any 6-year-old would: she cries, she begs, she throws a tantrum. She also tries to bypass her parents completely, appealing to Santa by decorating the hedges with bread. (This plan backfires, in a playful moment that makes great use of the word “EEEE.”) Finally, Yoon plays her trump card: “But, Father,” she says innocently. “America is our home now. Are we not both Korean and American?”

Yoon’s perspective is just askew enough to make her a believable outsider as well as a quirky individual: besides calling the big guy “Mr. Santa Claus,” she thinks of one classmate as “the freckle boy” and mistakes a candy cane for a piece of the striped North Pole. Where she really comes alive, though, is in Swiatkowska’s rich, textured illustrations. Impressionistic and drenched in color, these draw on a wealth of art history. Yoon’s plaintive dreams of the North Pole are like something from the Byzantine Empire, while her teacher resembles a Raphael Madonna and her classroom might have been decorated by William Morris.

Strangely, the book never answers Yoon’s central question: “Why did my father not like Christmas?” Korea officially recognizes the holiday, it turns out, and Christians make up the country’s largest religious group — but you won’t learn either fact from this book. True, Korea’s celebration is more understated than America’s (whose isn’t?), but it might have been nice to get a sense whether Yoon’s parents object to Mr. Santa on religious grounds or cultural ones.

To the book’s target audience, though, that question probably won’t matter any more than it does to Yoon herself. When children reach the book’s magical final spread, with Yoon peeking through saturated red curtains and licking a last taste of candy cane off her lips, here’s all they’re likely to be thinking: Yes, Yoon, there is a Santa Claus.

Gregory Cowles is an editor at the Book Review.

dava

About kids
Why couples in Europe don't want babies while we chinese do, perch88 ?

perch88

Why do you have that impression ?
I don't know European people ah
but it seems that developed country have more kids coz they can afford that and the kids can play with each other, in my opinion

dava

of course not, for instance, have you heard of that the population of Germany becomes smaller in recent years? And the same as Singapore.... ..

perch88

I don't know nothing about German except their passion for precision.
They are very smart guys.

dava

You are right, but German always have a serious face while American always smiling face

perch88

Correct. Somebody told me his experience of attending conference in Germany. I think German vs American is like Shanghaier vs Beijinger. They don't understand this when I told him even though his wife is from Taiwan.

But I would say 'not always'. Most German in Germany looks cold, but those in other places looks better. To my surprise, their English is closer to American style.