Story Wok – Details, episodes & analysis

Mythology

The 9th episode of Story Wok in October brings to you stories from the ether world. What better theme to end the Season Two of Story Wok than with mythological stories. Stories that are embroidered into every aspect of our life be it Art, festivals, beliefs or way of living. And just in case you have missed listening to any of the previous episodes...worry not, for this episode will give you a capsule hearing of Ace your story segment from all the previous episodes. 

Episode Hosts and Producers:

Anamika Bhati An educator working with children nurturing their creativity by bringing stories to life through drama, role-play and activities ensuring engaging and holistic learning. Someone who believes that stories are the best way of connecting and communicating with each other

Shelly Verma is a teller of tales who grew up in India listening to stories of kings, queens, animals, gods and goddesses from folklore and mythology. She carries these stories in her mind and her heart no matter where she is. Her repertoire includes stories from around the world but her main focus is using these stories to create awareness about the pressing issues of our times and be a part of the change. She believes in stories that inspire social change, give voice to the unheard and make the unseen noticed. You can find her stories on Facebook @Storyteller.ShellyVerma or Instagram @verma.shelly

Shubha Das is an Early Educator turned professional Storyteller who particularly enjoys indulging in and retelling folktales. She specializes in Malayalam classics, and stories based on cultural heritage with a contemporary edge. For her, stories are a piece of art, and hence, she believes in performing them in a manner that leaves an aural and visual imprint with linguistic hues in the minds of her audience.

 Featured Tellers:

 Ahn Sook Kim, Korea, A Storyteller and studying Korean folktales and classical literature at Kon kuk university.

Ambujavalli Nagarajan -- an IT professional turned storyteller-trainer and public speaker -- strongly believes that good stories spread healthy happiness. She is known for the performance elements that she weaves into her stories.

Ayushi Agrawal is an expressive art practitioner. She enjoys the creative world stories open up for her and her participants in their art -based self explorations.

Parvathy Eswaran is a storyteller by Passion and by Choice and believes that stories are there all around us in plenty as free as the air we breathe and we as storytellers can be the channel to spread them. She believes that storytelling is an important educational tool and conducts workshops for teachers on the techniques of storytelling. She also conducts workshops for children and adults on the art of storytelling. She has performed in many spaces including National Storytelling Network (USA), FEAST (Singapore), Chennai Storytelling Festival, Under the Aalamaram festival. Her journey in storytelling started at Kathalaya, after a 25 year stint in the corporate. She is a part of the creative storytelling group Katha Krafters.

 Write to us at feaststory@gmail.com | storywok@gmail.com

For details of upcoming events visit our website www.feast-story.org

The 9th episode of Story Wok in October brings to you stories from the ether world. 

What better theme to end the Season Two of Story Wok than with mythological stories. Stories that are embroidered into every aspect of our life be it Art, festivals, beliefs or way of living. 

And just incase you have missed listening to any of the previous episodes...worry not, for this episode will give you a capusle hearing of Ace your story segment from all the previous episodes. 

Mark your calendars! 24th October 2022!

A wise person once said,”Laughter is the best medicine”.

Laughter is an expression that knows no boundaries. Despite age gaps or cultural differences, people from all over the world and all walks of life know how to let out a laugh.So says Kausar Karimi ,Nidhi Gujral and Shelly Verma who also happen to be the hosts of our brand-new episode.

And so for the next hour or so in Episode 4, let’s laugh together.

Get ready for “Giggles and Guffaws” !

Sprinkle some silliness and let your heart be lighter with the stories we have lined up for you in Miso, Dimsum and Fortune cookie segments, a hearty spread of 3 tales told by 4 FEAST tellers. Jeff Gere(Hawaii) will tickle you silly with a story from Indonesia called “Odin and the Pinoy Bird”. Debjani Bhaduri(India) telling of an old Tamil folktale will send you into raptures. And Richa Sinha(India) and Meenu Sivaramakrishnan (India) multi-lingual story told in tandem in Bhojpuri and English will send your heart singing and laughing at the same time.

In our special “Ace your Story” segment, we chat with Antonio Rocha(USA), to find out all about using emotions while telling stories.He also shares an interesting advice on how important it is to distance oneself from the stories and find that perfect emotional balance while telling stories.

 Us podcast producers raise a cacophony in our Pantry segment twisting our tongues inside our mouths.Great for those looking to engage better with your audiences, a great ice-breaker game and also to loosen your tongue(we mean in the literal sense!) before telling stories.

Featured tongue twisters:

Kachcha Papad Pakka Papad

Red Lorry Yellow Lorry

Can you can a can as a canner can can a can?

Tikki Tikki Tembo-no Sa Rembo-chari Bari Ruchi-pip Peri Pembo 

(From the book “Tikki Tikki Tembo”. It is a 1968 picture book written by Arlene Mosel and illustrated by Blair Lent.)

Featured Storytellers

JEFF GERE 

Jeff Gere blends talents as painter, puppeteer, and mime into performances which have electrified audiences in Hawaii for 30 years. Jeff's physical energy, morphing elastic face and voice characteristics make his shows events. Jeff becomes his stories!

DEBJANI BHADURI

A decade ago, by sheer coincidence, Debjani came to know about the art form Storytelling. Since then she has been sharing stories across all age groups to spread happiness and joy.She loves retelling folktales, mythological accounts and authored classics lacing them with contemporary thread and adding a hint of humour.She believes stories could be the best way for skill development and she has been training teachers to teach concepts through stories and coaching corporate professionals soft skills through stories..

RICHA SINHA

Richa Sinha is the Founder of TheStoryMunch and a Festival curator. With her delightful stories in Hindi, English & Bhojpuri, she aims to increase the Happiness & Emotional Quotient of people.

MEENU SIVARAMAKRISHNAN

Meenu Sivaramakrishnan, a Performance Storyteller from Bengaluru, India, truly believes that stories are an experience that are not only entertaining but also enriching. After a decade in the IT industry, she quit to pursue her passion and love for performing Arts. She began her initiative called “KATHA GALATTA - Unleash Ur Joy Thru’ Stories” to rekindle the joy of discovering characters and revive the love for oral storytelling.

Featured Storytelling Expert

ANTONIO ROCHA

Antonio Rocha has performed his dynamic and unique fusion of mime, spoken word with realistic sound effects and his tenor voice from the USA to New Zealand covering 20 countries across 6 continents in venues such as The Kennedy Center, The Smithsonian, and Festivals in the US, Singapore, India, Taiwan and more. 

Antonio has many recordings, a picture book, is a two time TEDx presenter and amongst his many awards received, he has earned the coveted Circle of Excellence Award by the National Storytelling Network for his "exceptional commitment and exemplary contributions to the art of storytelling. 

www.storyinmotion.com

HOSTS:

Kausar Karimi

Kausar loves to travel and go for hikes and walks. She enjoys the outdoors and tries to look for stories that she comes across through her travels. Her motto is “There is a tale at every turn” and that keeps her interested in people and places. Not afraid to try different things, Kausar is a Speech and Drama instructor who uses stories to bring out the creative expression in the kids. She loves a good dramatization of folklore and often uses props and puppets to express herself.

Nidhi Gujral

Nidhi started her professional journey as a management consultant in the corporate sector. But eventually her love for finding and collecting stories everywhere around her led her to change her career path completely!She stepped into professional storytelling in the year 2019 out of passion for books & children. Thus, Pip & Squeak was born.

Since then, she has used her stories to advocate literacy, create thinkers, incite creativeness, and make learning fun by often coupling it with engaging activities & crafts to provide an experience that delights kids and parents alike. Find her stories on (https://www.instagram.com/pip_nd_squeak/) & (https://youtube.com/c/PipSqueakstories/)

Shelly Verma

Shelly Verma is a teller of tales who grew up in India listening to stories of kings, queens, animals, gods and goddesses from folklore and mythology. She carries these stories in her mind and her heart no matter where she is. Her repertoire includes stories from around the world but her main focus is using these stories to create awareness about the pressing issues of our times and be a part of the change. She believes in stories that inspire social change, give voice to the unheard and make the unseen noticed. You can find her stories on Facebook @Storyteller.ShellyVerma or Instagram @verma.shelly

Story Wok is produced by FEAST(Federation of Asian Storytellers ), (https://www.feast-story.org/ ). Our focus is on spreading Asian stories, celebrating colours from the Philippines in the east to Turkey in the west and the story telling communities that lie in between.

Write to us at feaststory@gmail.com | storywok@gmail.com

For details of upcoming events visit our website www.feast-story.org

Mark your calendars, May 24th, 2022, when Episode 4 of Story Wok, Season 2 , brings to you stories which will make you 'Giggle and Guffaw' and make you roll on the floor.

Nature Narratives, the theme for this episode resonates with that of Earth Day 2022, ‘Invest in our planet’. The stories and the discussions revolve around conservation of Nature. 

An elephant who lived in the foothills of the Himalayas lost the twinkle in her eyes. Did she find it back? Listen to this story in our Miso segment as narrated beautifully by Ramya Iyer  from India. 

One man’s trash is another’s treasure, says, Mindy Neo through this wonderful story In Dim Sum, the adult segment.

Our Fortune Cookie is a beautiful tandem storytelling in Malayalam and English by Sarita Nair and Shubha Das. 

“You have to make your telling your telling, bringing in your unique sensibilities to the telling”, advises the expert, Roger Jenkins in the segment Ace the Story, where we have our producer Parvathy Eswaran interviewing Roger Jenkins. 

Don't miss the interesting and lively conversation among the episode producers, about Nature, in our pantry discussion, followed by FEAST offerings in the month of May. 

Episode Hosts & Producers:

Dharanya Sreenivasan is a puppeteer and storyteller working with children and stories in various mediums like puppet shows, role play, oral telling and writing. Instilling love for reading is her passion project.

Meenu Sivaramakrishnan is a performance storyteller from India, truly believes that stories are an experience that are not only entertaining but also enriching. And of course, what better way to connect with people than Stories!

Parvathy Eswaran is a storyteller by passion and by choice, believes that stories are there everywhere just like the air we breathe and we, as storytellers act as a medium to spread and bring the stories to you. 

Featured Tellers

Ramya Iyer is a professional storyteller and writer. She believes in the strength of a warm, holding and healing space. She finds herself working towards bringing people closer to themselves and connected to each other through story and expression. In her story work, she works with children and adults. She seeks to contribute to helping people transform, heal and live fulfilling lives. She is fascinated by the magic that every moment, every day, every person's story holds, and intrigued by dreams. Her storytelling initiatives is called ‘The Bright Lamp Storytells’. She is trying to live a fulfilling life one breath, one step, one day at a time.

Mindy Neo enjoys connecting with adults and children through the ancient art of story. She loves insights and lessons best when they’re wrapped in funny or poignant stories. She tells traditional tales as well as true stories from her own life. She also tells stories of biodiversity and conservation and hopes that through storytelling people might have a deeper sense of humanity and appreciation for biodiversity.

Sarita Nair, Sarita Nair adorns various hats, that of a Performance/Therapeutic Storyteller, a Theater practitioner/ facilitator and of a curator. She is the founder- of Heritage Stories & Performing Arts (HSPA). HSPA is an initiative established with an intent to celebrate cultural heritage, share and transfer heritage knowledge through stories and performing arts. Itihaas ke pannon se...a live storytelling avenue, on the HSPA Facebook page is her tribute to our freedom fighters, where she brings to you stories of unsung heroes who sacrificed their lives to gain India her freedom, since the year August 2020. 

Shubha Das is an Early Educator turned professional Storyteller who particularly enjoys indulging in and retelling folktales. She specializes in Malayalam classics, and stories based on cultural heritage with a contemporary edge. For her, stories are a piece of art, and hence, she believes in performing them in a manner that leaves an aural and visual imprint with linguistic hues in the minds of her audience.

Roger Jenkins  is a Singaporean storyteller, a co-founder and Director of FEAST. He has narrated nine audiobooks for Storytel (including adult, youth and children’s fiction, sci-fi and non-fiction titles.) He is a trained audio-describer who makes live performance accessible for vision-impaired audiences, and is an award-winning poet. ’Not Just at Bedtime! Tips and Tales for Parent Storytellers’ is a two hour video for anyone who wants to bond with their audience, and is available on the website rogerjenkins.com.sg.  

Story Wok is produced by FEAST ( Federation of Asian Storytellers), our focus is on spreading Asian stories, celebrating the tellers from the Philippines in the East to Turkey in the West and the storytelling communities that lie in-between.

Write to us at feaststory@gmail.com | storywok@gmail.com

For details of upcoming events visit our website www.feast-story.org

Mark your calendars, April 24th, 2022, when Episode 3 of Story Wok, Season 2 , brings to you stories around the theme 'Nature Narratives'.

This is a very special episode, for, we are celebrating World Storytelling Day 2022. World Storytelling Day is a worldwide celebration of Oral Storytelling celebrated each year on March 20 and the goal is to celebrate the art of storytelling with as many people as possible, both listeners and storytellers. Each year World Storytelling Day has a theme around which the storytellers tell their stories. The storytellers are free to choose their stories, but most of them try to connect to the theme.

The theme of World Storytelling Day 2022 is “Lost and Found”. It was inspired by all that we lost in the past years, and the hope of stories inspiring us to find it back again.

Taqarrabie from Indonesia enthusiastically narrates an Indonesian story for the children and young at heart. Do you know that a pair of slippers lost something? Listen to this beautiful story in our Miso segment to know what the pair of slippers finally found. 

In Dim Sum, the adult segment, we bring to you the story of Iravaan, one of the lesser known stories from Mahabharatha, the great Indian epic, wonderfully narrated by Meera Venkatesan. Pure love found and lost just in a day!!

Our Fortune Cookie is a beautiful Malay story of how perseverance and a kind heart can bring back what one lost. Juriah Atan and Kausar Karimi seamlessly narrate this story not in one but two languages, Malay and English. 

“Mapping of a story is non-negotiable and is a must” says Rituparna Ghosh in the segment Ace the Story, where we have our producer Shubha interviewing Rituparna. She shares some tips on how to go about mapping a story.

Last but not the least, wouldn’t you like to know what we producers ‘lost and found’ . Listen to our pantry discussion and also to know the Feast offerings in the month of April. 

Episode Hosts & Producers:

Prakrati Agrawal, a storyteller and an edutainer, loves telling stories that make one laugh and learn at the same time.

Shubha Das particularly enjoys indulging in and telling folktales. For her stories are a piece of art and hence,believes in performing it in a manner that leaves an aural and visual imprint with linguistic hues in the minds of her audience.

Parvathy Eswaran: A storyteller by passion and by choice, believes that stories are there everywhere just like the air we breathe and we, as storytellers act as a medium to spread and bring the stories to you.

Featured Tellers

Taqarrabie is a filmmaker, author, and storyteller who is passionate about spreading Indonesian stories and her own original stories in Bahasa Indonesia, Minangkabau, and English. She was introduced to the universe of oral telling by her parents when she was little, and she began her journey as a teller in 2017. Bie has performed at various storytelling festivals, libraries, events, hospitals, and schools for children and adults. She also has given basic storytelling workshops for teachers, parents, and students. She loves costume parties if you'd like to invite her to one!

Meera Venkatesan is a professional performance storyteller, trainer and learning consultant with a love of words and a deep desire to create meaningful learning. She has combined these passions to carve a space in applying stories to cement learning. She spearheads content with Anahata United efforts, an NGO providing career guidance to children. She specializes in creating story based curriculums for Social Emotional Learning, Communication skills, Languages, STEM and many more. She is a part of the creative storytelling group Katha Krafters who specialize in training, and curating performances for adults and children. She has participated in both online and offline storytelling festivals.

Juriah Atan, is a storyteller from Singapore. As an educator and workshop facilitator, she uses stories to engage participants. She has told stories to all age groups, from preschoolers to seniors. She loves stories with a touch of humour. She tells stories in English and Malay. 

Kausar Karimi loves to travel and go for hikes and walks. She enjoys the

outdoors and tries to look for stories that she comes across through her travels. Her motto is “There is a tale at every turn” and that keeps her interested in people and places. Not afraid to try different things, Kausar is a Speech and Drama instructor who uses stories to bring out the creative expression in the kids. She loves a good dramatization of folklore and often uses props and puppets to express herself.

Rituparna Ghosh:You can describe her as a story digger, story charmer, story gatherer, story extractor, story spotter…she is anything but just a storyteller! An international storyteller and a TEDx speaker Rituparna is the Founder of Your Story Bag, a Storytelling, Training, and Consulting company. She works with listeners, children, adults, organisations, not-for-profits, and corporates helping them harness the power of stories. Rituparna produces two podcasts called Golpo, Stories from Around the World, and What’s in Your Story Bag. She believes that Storytelling will be the strongest currency in the world and she is actively engaged in making it a sustainable career in India. 

Story Wok is produced by FEAST ( Federation of Asian Storytellers), our focus is on spreading Asian stories, celebrating the tellers from the Philippines in the East to Turkey in the West and the storytelling communities that lie in-between.

Write to us at feaststory@gmail.com | storywok@gmail.com

For details of upcoming events visit our website www.feast-story.org

Mark your calendars, March 24th, 2022, when Episode 2 of StoryWok, Season 2 , brings to you stories around the theme 'Lost and Found', celebrating World Storytelling Day.

Episode One of Story Wok Podcast Season 2 , is all about Metamorphosis, where we hav stories of transformation and change by storytellers Alla Lebedeva ( Russia), Nancy Leppard (Singapore) and Dharanya and Banu Mathy (India) in kids,adults and bilingual segments respectively. 

In our brand-new segment of Ace the Story, Shelly talks to Dr. Csenge Virág Zalka and asks her insights on scouting or looking for a story.

And step into Pantry to listen to the podcast producers talk about the different aspects of their theme “Metamorphosis”

Episode Hosts & Producers:

Nidhi Gujral – Nidhi started her professional journey as a management consultant in the corporate sector. But eventually her love for finding and collecting stories everywhere around her led her to change her career path completely!

She stepped into professional storytelling in the year 2019 out of passion for books & children. Thus, Pip & Squeak was born.

Since then, she has used her stories to advocate literacy, create thinkers, incite creativeness, and make learning fun by often coupling it with engaging activities & crafts to provide an experience that delights kids and parents alike. Find her stories on (https://www.instagram.com/pip_nd_squeak/) & (https://youtube.com/c/PipSqueakstories/)

Shelly Verma-Shelly Verma is a teller of tales who grew up in India listening to stories of kings, queens, animals, gods and goddesses from folklore and mythology. She carries these stories in her mind and her heart no matter where she is. Her repertoire includes stories from around the world but her main focus is using these stories to create awareness about the pressing issues of our times and be a part of the change. She believes in stories that inspire social change, give voice to the unheard and make the unseen noticed. You can find her stories on Facebook @Storyteller.ShellyVerma or Instagram @verma.shelly

Kausar Karimi-  Kausar loves to travel and go for hikes and walks. She enjoys the outdoors and tries to look for stories that she comes across through her travels. Her motto is “There is a tale at every turn” and that keeps her interested in people and places. Not afraid to try different things, Kausar is a Speech and Drama instructor who uses stories to bring out the creative expression in the kids. She loves a good dramatization of folklore and often uses props and puppets to express herself.

FEATURED TELLERS :

Alla Lebedeva from Russia tells stories to audiences aged from 1.5 to 100, conducts workshops for teachers and helps people to tell stories of their lives as she believes our souls talk through stories!

Dr. Csenge Virág Zalka is an international storyteller and author from Hungary. Her repertoire consists of a wide variety of old traditional stories - from myths and epics all the way to rare versions of fairy tales. She travels the world, performing in English, Spanish, and Hungarian. She has published several folktale collections in Hungarian and English. Csenge currently lives in Budapest, and works as a storyteller with the Világszép Foundation for Children in State Care. You can follow her on Twitter (@TarkabarkaHolgy) and visit her blog for articles on world folklore (http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com).

Nancy Leppard- Growing up in Singapore, Nancy read and heard stories from many countries and cultures. She loved how stories took her to different places and experiences. And now she loves sharing stories with others, transporting them to other worlds. Nancy conducted a webinar for FEAST titled- STORIES FOR ALL - where she shared her experiences as a storyteller in the special needs classroom.

Banu Mathy-Every Saturday, she shares stories to children through her Weekend Storytelling Session in her organization Fables n Tales. She has performed at Chennai Storytelling Festival, India (2013 to present) and also Under the Aalamaram - Kathai Kalatta ( 2014), besides that at various libraries and books stores. She has also shared her stories virtually in Worldwide Storytelling Guild and Feast Story swap. Banu Mathy likes to tell Asian Folktales and stories involving Myths and legends incorporating her unique style of songs, chants, voice modulation and props. She adapts her storytelling style depending on her audience.

Dharanya: A puppeteer and storyteller from Chennai (India) who loves working with children and stories in various mediums like puppet shows, role play, oral telling and writing. Instilling love for reading in young ones is one of her passions. Through story telling her aim is to reach more kids and promote the love for our culture and folklores.

Story Wok is produced by FEAST ( Federation of Asian Storytellers), our focus is on spreading Asian stories, celebrating the tellers from the Philippines in the East to Turkey in the West and the storytelling communities that lie in-between.

Write to us at feaststory@gmail.com | storywok@gmail.com

For details of upcoming events visit our website www.feast-story.org

Welcome to the Season Two of Story Wok podcast.

The Story Wok - is a podcast by Storytellers for Storytellers. We hope that means you, whether you identify yourself as a storyteller with a capital “S”, or if you just like to tell stories in your work - say as a teacher, librarian, counsellor, or community leader. And not forgetting if you are a parent or grandparent looking to share stories and values with your family.

And since the Story Wok is produced by FEAST ( Federation of Asian Storytellers), our focus is on spreading Asian stories, celebrating the tellers from the Philippines in the East to Turkey in the West and the storytelling communities that lie in-between.

The podcast is produced by 9 producers:

Shelly Verma (Switzerland)

Nidhi Gujral (India)

Kausar Karimi (Singapore)

Prakriti Agarwal (India)

Anamika Bhati (Singapore)

Dharanya (India)

Meenu (India)

Shubha (India)

Parvathy (India)

Lean in & listen, meet the podcast producers and peep into our story spread.

New episode coming on 24th February 2022

Write to us at feaststory@gmail.com OR storywork@gmail.com

#AsianStorytellers #AsianStories #FEAST #StoryWok