Stories from home. Stories from the world.

I’m Janice Shiu, the writer and traveler behind Kalinga Storyteller.

I migrated from the Philippines to the United States in my early twenties and built a life here. I am Kalinga, one of the Indigenous Peoples of the northern Philippines, and that background influences how I pay attention to place, culture, representation, and the stories people choose to carry forward.

In 2022, my husband and I made a deliberate decision to travel and see more of the world. Our first safari took us to the Maasai Mara. Since then, our travels have taken us through wildlife reserves, cities, cultural landscapes, islands, mountains, and communities across several continents.

Somewhere along the way, simply seeing a place stopped being enough.

I wanted to understand it.

How I Travel

Kalinga Storyteller looks beyond the highlight.

When we travel, I’m interested in the details surrounding the experience: how wildlife is protected, how tourism affects communities, how traditions are presented to visitors, what everyday life looks like, and what we wish we had known before arriving.

That can mean understanding where a gorilla trekking permit goes in Rwanda, learning why communities near protected areas matter to conservation, or questioning how a cultural tradition is being presented to tourists.

It can also be much simpler: what we ate, how we got there, what surprised us, what went wrong, and whether I would do it differently next time.

I don't travel as an expert on the places I visit. I travel curious enough to ask questions, pay attention, and keep learning.

Two People, Two Perspectives

Most of these journeys are shared with my husband.

Our roots are in Asia—mine in the Philippines and his in India—and we sometimes notice different things in the same place.

Kalinga Storyteller is grounded in those lived experiences: what we saw, what we learned, what worked for us, and what we would do differently.

That is also the foundation of the travel guides on this site.

Stories From Home

Before there were stories from around the world, there were stories from home.

I write children’s books based on oral traditions from the Kalinga Indigenous Peoples of the Philippines. Through Philippine Folktales from the Kalinga Indigenous Peoples, I retell stories passed through generations for young readers today.

For me, this work and travel storytelling are connected.

Travel asks me to listen carefully to the stories of other places.

My books ask me to help carry forward the stories of my own.

Explore Kalinga Storyteller

Travel Guides — What we learned from places we’ve actually visited — practical advice, cultural context, unexpected moments, and what we would do differently.

Kalinga Folktales — Children’s books carrying oral traditions into written form for another generation.