This is Tomatokind

A Literary Canvas of Local Ingenuity

Welcome to Tomatokind. I am its creator, Vanessa Li - a writer, performing artist, community maker and researcher, and local guide based in Berkeley, California.

I hope you’ll join me here to share in the stories and narratives of the people, places, and beings that make up our world - to fascinate in the anecdotes, the tangential plot-lines, supporting characters, and backdrops of the paths we and others take.

For the past decade, I have delved into the ingredients of social connectedness, and collective joy & caretaking. I have researched the impacts of social isolation on our quality of life, and have written fiction and nonfiction based on the role of relationships and place-making in our livelihoods.

Tomatokind is a place to embrace our shared experiences and witness the peaks and troughs of our life-courses and passions. On a weekly basis, I’ll be sharing mini memoirs from interviews I have conducted, chronicles from neighborhood field visits, and poetry & prose inspired by my wanderings. Read more about the origin of Tomatokind here.