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Welcome to Kawan—our vibrant community of data heads and storytellers. We’re all about improving data literacy and sharing nuanced stories about Asia. Come hang!

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Kontinentalist
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silver linings — issue #61

A couple of weeks ago, I moved to Dunedin, New Zealand, or Aotearoa, as it is beloved in Māori, to pursue a Master’s degree in Geographic Information Systems. I had to transfer at the Auckland International Airport, where I went through a few rounds of biosecurity checks. Before you

Zafirah Zein
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Countering climate doom

When we decided on “silver lining” as the theme of our latest newsletter, I thought it apt to highlight positive stories about the environment to counter the deluge of bleak, and at times terrifying climate news. Yet, while I was keen to find data or visual stories on positive climate

Recent Posts

Kontinentalist
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Where got ghost in Singapore?— issue #5

Trick or treat! It's Halloween season! The ghouls and pumpkins fill store aisles across Singapore. But Southeast Asia has about as many ghouls as we have tropical fruits and types of spices. We're diverse like that. So step away from the usual stories and explore our

Kontinentalist
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Humans of Kontinentalist: Rayson

A few weeks ago we caught up with Rayson, our summer intern. Rayson is a third-year university student studying for a Bachelor in…

Gwyneth Cheng
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A quick guide to ArcGIS — how do we begin?

What is GIS?

Kontinentalist
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Humans of Kontinentalist: Dewi

Today we caught up with Dewi, our business development manager, and recently, writer! Her first story on Batik was released last week.

Kontinentalist
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Did a four-eyed historian invent the Mandarin script? — issue #4

Hello,你好,வணக்கம் Singapore has always favoured linguistic pragmatism, where we learn a language for its utility. Increasingly, that language is Mandarin. People often tell me, "You should let your child take Mandarin as a second language. It's better for her." No offence is intended

Kontinentalist
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Rayson’s Journey to the Maps: Interning at Kontinentalist

Rayson, who wrote this well-received story on rising sea levels, shares his intern experience at Kontinentalist.

Rifqi Ruhyattamam
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Reduce API loading time: Never forget to Cache!

Kontinentalist serves quite numbers of traffic everyday, and thus user experience is really important for us. One of the UX factors apart… How did Kontinentalist reduce API loading time by using Cache

Kontinentalist
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How to tell data-driven stories

We conducted a workshop for our writers recently, and below are some of the highlights.

Kontinentalist
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Visualising a team bonding retreat

Inspired by the Dear Data project where two designers sent each other visualisations describing their week, our team decided to try…

Kontinentalist
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Of piracy, deaths, and medicinal wildlife parts in Asia — issue #3

Ahoy! It’s been a really fruitful month for us, and we’re so proud to have collaborated with two different partners to shed light on crucial issues concerning Asia. Naomi collaborated with TRAFFIC - the wildlife trade monitoring network - to look at how traditional medicine practices and beliefs

Kontinentalist
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Playing House: the Rent-a-Family business in Japan

Our writer, Kathy, shares her thoughts on the thriving phenomenon in Japan

Kontinentalist
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How are maps used in video and tabletop games?

In our new series, we sat down with Joceline, our UI/UX designer, and Griselda, our multimedia designer, to nerd out about maps and games!