¡Yo soy boricua…Sólo pa’ que tu lo sepa’! (I’m Puerto Rican… just so you know!) – Rosie Perez

Last weekend was the Puerto Rican Day Parade in downtown Chicago, and accompanying festival in the Humboldt Park neighborhood. Many people outside of the US, and some notable Americans, are unaware that the island of Puerto Rico is actually a United States commonwealth.

Since 1917, Puerto Ricans have been US citizens, and enjoy many benefits of citizenship, including passport/visa-free travel and work in the United States, and US military protection. However, Puerto Ricans (residing in Puerto Rico) cannot vote in federal elections, have no voting members in the US Congress, and yet still have to pay US federal taxes. There have been several Puerto Rican political movements for both independence and US Statehood, but as of today, Puerto Rico is still an unincorporated territory.

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A week doesn’t go by without tempura of some sort being eaten in my house. And when I’m out and about hardly a day goes by that I don’t catch myself snacking on tempura, somewhere.

Coming from upstate New York, I had never heard of, let alone seen tempura until I arrived in Japan. So, I naturally assumed it was a Japanese invention.

Light and soft, golden-tanned tempura or browned, crunchy tempura. Have your choice, they’re all delicious. There’s battered fried shrimp tempura, onions, peppers, carrots, pumpkin, green beans and probably any vegetable you can think of tempura. You won’t walk a city block anywhere in Japan without seeing a sign advertising tempura or smelling tempura being cooked at someone’s house.

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This week is the last week of Ramadan for the Muslim world, and Global Voices Online reported on a mission by two New York Muslims to visit 30 mosques in 30 days:

Two young men in New York City, Aman Ali and Bassam Tariq, are nearing the end of their journey to document visits to “30 mosques in 30 days” on their blog of the same name.

The personal project to visit and photograph the insides of mosques throughout the holy month of Ramadan (during which Muslims fast from dawn to sunset) has even attracted the attention of local New York television.

Read the rest of the post at Global Voices.

Image credit: 30 mosques in 30 days

This project shows the true diversity of New York City - the journey covered a different community every day: Sunni and Shia, Albanian, Indonesian, Pakistani, Middle Eastern and many more.

It’s a great way to see how each community celebrates Ramadan in its own way.

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Religion in the USA
Ramadan Kareem
Which are the most religious countries in the world?

Thanks to the internet you don’t need to travel to see what people are wearing in other parts of the world. Here are five sites to take in the different street styles on five continents.

North America: New York, USA

The king of street fashion blogs for many people is The Sartorialist. He has been photographing stylish New Yorkers since 2005, and The Sartorialist is now a design influence in its own right.

Europe: Poland

Pretty and stylish Lula Street shows that Poles have plenty of individuality when it comes to dressing.

Africa: Johannesburg, South Africa

Nontsikelelo ‘Lolo’ Veleko lives and works in Johannesburg. She featured young South Africans from the streets of Johannesburg in her series “Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder”. See some of the portraits on Afronova.

Asia: Tokyo, Japan

We’ve written before about the original fashions on display in Tokyo. But different districts of Tokyo have a distinctive style of their own. On Tokyo street style you can find fashions from Harajuku, Shibuya, Omotesando, Daikanyama and Ginza.

South America: Buenos Aires, Argentina

On the Corner shows colourful and alternative fashion found on the streets of Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Agostina, a 23 year old cook, from On the Corner

Do you have a favourite site for street fashion that we haven’t included here? Share it with us in the comments.

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Ever tried making your own Mongolian boots?
Street style from Finland
Fashion freedom in Japan