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Rebirth and change come every spring, and this year beijingkids is blooming with new staff. We’ve said “see you around” to former Managing Editor, Aisling O’Brien, School Editor, Yvette Ferrari, and Shunyi Correspondent, Sally Wilson. We’ve introduced you toJessica Suotmaa, the current School Editor, Anjana Kainikkara, the new Shunyi Correspondent, and Andrew Killeen, our interim Managing Editor and, Vanessa Jencks, the incoming Managing Editor, starting full time in July. The last one standing from the class of 2013/14 is Nimo Wanjau, moving from Web Editor to Senior Editor.
What did you want to be when you grew up?
A milkmaid! (Wait, let me explain.) I love animals but some of them don’t reciprocate the feeling. My family has a farm in the highland region of Kenya, where my father hails from.The animals on the farm always fascinated me, so I would follow my parents around when they went to oversee the work being done there. I especially liked watching the cows get milked, so I declared that I wanted to be a milkmaid; my parents had other ideas. 
Rebirth and change come every spring, and this year beijingkids is blooming with new staff. We’ve said “see you around” to former Managing Editor, Aisling O’Brien, School Editor, Yvette Ferrari, and Shunyi Correspondent, Sally Wilson. We’ve introduced you to Jessica Suotmaa, the current School Editor, Anjana Kainikkara, the new Shunyi Correspondent, and Andrew Killeen, our interim Managing Editor. Lastly, meet Vanessa Jencks, the incoming Managing Editor, starting full time in July.
What did you want to be when you grew up?
I wanted to be a writer! I wrote my first “book” when I was in second grade. My instructors, from second grade to college, frequently told me I would be one in the future. Ironically, their encouragement mixed with my fear of failure concerning this high-pressure dream delayed my pursuit until I turned twenty-five, (many serious writers start practicing in their teenage years). I explored every other interest until then, from fashion design to web design to education.-
It seems incredible when I think that we’ve been in Beijing for less than eight months. So much has happened in that time: we’ve met so many amazing people, traveled to extraordinary places, had so many new experiences. I’ve made stumbling progress toward learning a new language, and have embarked on a new career with beijingkids.
Prior to this I lived most of my life in Birmingham, England, where I worked for many years in a variety of roles supporting homeless and disadvantaged families and children. For the last three years I’ve been a full-time writer, editor and creative writing teacher. My published books are historical thrillers, in which a poet and a thief solve mysteries in early medieval Baghdad. (The Father of Locks and The Khalifah’s Mirror are both published by Dedalus Books; you can read reviews of them here.) I’m now working on something very different though, an epic, experimental science fiction novel set at the end of the universe (currently around 500 pages and still unfinished!)
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Rebirth and change come every spring, and this year beijingkids is blooming with new staff. We’ve said “see you around” to former Managing Editor, Aisling O’Brien, School Editor, Yvette Ferrari, and Shunyi Correspondent, Sally Wilson. We’ve introduced you toJessica Suotmaa, the current School Editor. Now meet Anjana Kainikkara, the new Shunyi Correspondent. We’ll introduce Andrew Killeen and Vanessa Jencks this weekend.
What did you want to be when you grew up?
As a child and all the way until I went to College, I wanted to be a professional Bharatnatyam Dancer (a form of Indian Classical Dance from the South of India). The sole purpose of going to college to train as a Civil Engineer was to be able use that as a fall back should my dancing career not pan out. -
Rebirth and change come every spring, and this year beijingkids is blooming with new staff. We’ve said “see you around” to former Managing Editor, Aisling O’Brien, School Editor, Yvette Ferrari, and Shunyi Correspondent, Sally Wilson. Over the next week, we’ll be spotlighting different beijingkids staff members; today, meet our new School Editor, Jessica Suotmaa.