by Melanie Oda (Japan) | Apr 24, 2012 | Eye on Culture, Holiday, Humor, Japan, Life Lesson, Motherhood, Parenting, World Motherhood
I had really hoped this year would be the year.
The year I could put the Hina Matsuri (Girls’ Day) dolls out in the living room where we could enjoy them. It’s such a nice tradition: displaying beautifully intricate (and sickeningly expensive) dolls in traditional seven-layered kimonos for the weeks leading up to Girls’ Day on March 3rd, when the whole family pauses to pray for the health and well-being of daughters before feasting on feminine, cutesy foods, like tiny sushi and soup with delicate candy colored balls, followed by pink and green omochi (sticky, sweet rice cakes) for desert. Ladies magazines are full of hina (imperial princess) themed recipes. This year I think we’ll try the “parfait sushi,” which is sushi rice layered with eggs and other colorful ingredients in a glass so it looks like a parfait. I’m also thinking of ordering a Hina Matsuri themed ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins (known here as 31 Ice.)
Of course, the best laid plans of mice and moms often go awry. Or something like that. (more…)
If you ask Melanie Oda where she is from, she will answer "Georgia." (Unless you ask her in Japanese. Then she will say "America.") It sounds nice, and it's a one-word answer, which is what most people expect. The truth is more complex. She moved around several small towns in the south growing up. Such is life when your father is a Southern Baptist preacher of the hellfire and brimstone variety.
She came to Japan in 2000 as an assistant language teacher, and has never managed to leave. She currently resides in Yokohama, on the outskirts of Tokyo (but please don't tell anyone she described it that way! Citizens of Yokohama have a lot of pride). No one is more surprised to find her here, married to a Japanese man and with two bilingual children (aged four and seven), than herself. And possibly her mother.
You can read more about her misadventures in Asia on her blog, HamakkoMommy.
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by Ruth | Apr 20, 2012 | Culture, Eye on Culture, Family, Motherhood, Parent Care, Parenting, Ruth Wong, Singapore, World Motherhood
Have you ever thought about why you’re having kids?
Some have kids because they think it’s part of the “marriage progression”, they want to carry on their bloodline or because everyone around them are having children.
Others feel that they want to leave a legacy through their offspring. Then there are those who do it simply because they have a strong desire to have children.
In Asia, it’s not uncommon for people to want to have children to ensure that there’s someone to look after them when they turn old. In fact, there’s even a Chinese idiom 养儿防老 – which translates to mean “raise children to safeguard your old age”.
Indeed, in Asian societies that have been strongly influenced by Confucius teachings, such as China, Japan, Korea and Singapore, the practice of filial piety is still seen as an important social value and esteemed as virtue to be inculcated in one’s children from a very young age.
Children are not only expected to respect and obey their parents, it’s also deemed their duty to look after their parents in old age. (more…)
Ruth lives in Singapore, a tiny island 137 kilometres north of the equator. After graduating from university, she worked as a medical social worker for a few years before making a switch to HR and worked in various industries such as retail, banking and manufacturing. In spite of the invaluable skills and experiences she had gained during those years, she never felt truly happy or satisfied. It was only when she embarked on a journey to rediscover her strengths and passion that this part of her life was transformed. Today, Ruth is living her dreams as a writer. Ironically, she loves what she does so much that at one point, she even thought that becoming a mom would hinder her career. Thanks to her husband’s gentle persuasions, she now realises what joy she would have missed out had she not changed her mind. She is now a happy WAHM. Ruth launched MomME Circle, a resource site to support and inspire moms to create a life and business they love. She has a personal blog Mommy Café where she writes about her son's growing up and shares her interests such as food and photography.
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by Asha (Nigeria) | Apr 19, 2012 | Childhood, Culture, Family, Humor, Husband, India, Motherhood, Nigeria, USA, World Motherhood
At first glance, I appear to be a typical Indian-American woman. My parents immigrated to the U.S. in the 1970’s. My father is a physician. My mother holds strong opinions on the merits of silk versus French chiffon saris.Until recently, I lived in New Jersey, and really, what Indian-American doesn’t? My investment banker husband and I have 3 children who attended Hindi class every Friday night for years.
You should know, however, that there are aspects of my life that Indians frown upon.
The aforementioned husband is Nigerian, a people distrusted in this era of 419 scams by Indians and non-Indians alike. And even more damning to a subcontinent that fetishizes degrees, I walked out of a top law school after a week and never looked back.
Upon closer examination, I am NOT a typical Indian-American. From the standpoint of most Indians, truth be told, I am a dud. (more…)
by Purnima Ramakrishnan | Apr 6, 2012 | 2012, Child Care, Childhood, Culture, Human Rights, Humanity, India, International, Life Balance, Social Good, The Advocates of Human Rights, The Alchemist, Women's Rights, World Voice
I am a woman and I am writing from India. So, what is special about that, you may ask.
Save the girl child of India
The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN-DESA), has now officially declared that India is the most dangerous place for a girl child to be.
India is the country that gave the world the second woman prime minister (Indira Gandhi in 1966). India has sent its women to space; its women have marked their places in sports, the corporate world, Hollywood and just about everywhere else, too.
But I will not bore you with statistics and data that you can check out on your own here, here and here. The point of my post is to bring to light the reasons behind this statement. First, there are some sociocultural pieces I would like to highlight.
- In India, a girl is ‘married off’ and sent away to live with her husband and in-laws. It is called the joint-family system (couple, children, husband’s parents, sometimes even the husband’s brother’s family in some cases) opposed to the nuclear family system (more…)
by Alison | Mar 28, 2012 | Malaysia, Motherhood, Sleep, Sleep and Children, World Motherhood
Sleep is a big topic in my house.
I’m willing to bet a dozen cupcakes it is in yours, too.
Does the 2 year old get enough sleep? Will I ever get a full night’s sleep ever again? Will we co-sleep with the second child? Do we have a good bedtime routine for the toddler? How will the new baby sleep when he arrives? Will the baby wake the toddler or vice versa?
Sleep does not come easy for any of us in my household.
Due to the nature of his work, and that he suffers from insomnia off and on, my husband goes to bed late (think after 2.00 a.m.). There is also a lot of tossing and turning going on before sleep finally comes. (more…)
Alison is a former PR professional turned stay-at-home mother to two boys. Growing up in a small city of Ipoh, Malaysia, Alison left home at 17 to pursue her studies in the big city of Kuala Lumpur. At 19, she headed to University of Leeds in England and graduated with a degree in Communications. Returning home to Malaysia in 1999, she began a 10-year career in public relations, event planning, and marketing, working for various PR agencies and one of the world's biggest sports brands. After a decade of launch parties and product launches, concerts and award shows, international press junkets and world travel, Alison traded all that in for a life as a first time mother in 2009, and has not looked back since. Aside from writing for her blog, Writing, Wishing, Alison is the Founder and chief social media strategist for Little Love Media.
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by World Moms Blog | Mar 24, 2012 | Domesticity, Eva Fannon, Family, Husband, Japan, Rox is Brilliant, Saturday Sidebar, South Korea
This week’s Saturday Sidebar Question comes from World Moms Blog writer Kyla P’an. She was wondering,
“How often does laundry get done in your home and who does it?”
Check out what some of our World Moms had to say…
Maggie Ellison of South Carolina, USA writes:
“Laundry gets done by me every day of the week, except the weekends. I take weekends off!”
Kyla P’an of Massachusetts, USA writes:
“Ironically, I’m sitting down to e-mail after folding two baskets (one light, one dark) of laundry. But it is for the very response posted above by Maggie, and echoed by so many of my friends, that I posed this question in the first place. I cannot fathom doing laundry every day.
For our family of 4 (two adults, a 6yo girl and a 3yo boy) we do laundry every 7-10 days. And typically my husband washes (he finds it therapeutic to combat stains) and I fold. We are by no means slovenly people, we’re just conservative I suppose. Aside from undergarments, workout clothes and socks, many things get refolded and put back in a drawer at the end of the day. I simply cannot get my head around having enough wash to justify a daily load…could someone please enlighten me?” (more…)
World Moms Blog is an award winning website which writes from over 30 countries on the topics of motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. Over 70 international contributors share their stories from around the globe, bonded by the common thread of motherhood and wanting a better world for their children.
World Moms Blog was listed by Forbes Woman as one of the "Best 100 Websites for Women 2012 & 2013" and also called a "must read" by the NY Times Motherlode in 2013. Our Senior Editor in India, Purnima Ramakrishnan, was awarded the BlogHer International Activist Award in 2013.
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I had really hoped this year would be the year.
