GUEST POST: A Wish For World Mothers Party!

GUEST POST: A Wish For World Mothers Party!

WFWM-Tree-Collage-FinalThe World Moms are making a difference in the world, and we get excited to see our friends and readers run with something we’ve advocated for. Today we are featuring a guest post from a friend of the blog, Shilpa, owner of the online global home and fashion retailer, Harabu House

“Equal pay for women”, “Healthy Children”, “A Good Sleep”, “A Good Education”, “Safe and Healthy Pregnancies” are just some of the wishes expressed for world moms at a casual event hosted by Jennifer Burden, founder of World Moms Blog. Jennifer had organized this event to highlight her trip to Uganda with the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life program, while telling a group of about 30 women about the women behind World Moms Blog and their social good initiatives.

A mutual friend of ours had suggested that Jen and I would hit it off with our interest in all things global, and we sure did! I was thrilled when I received an invitation to her event as I wanted to know more about her trip to Uganda.

We enjoyed wine, cheese and chocolate at Jen’s house and shared our own wishes for world mothers on a tree created from cardboard on her wall. Then, she called us into her family room in the middle of the party for a presentation.  With her laptop connected to her T.V., she took us on a journey to Uganda through pictures. (more…)

World Moms Blog

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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NEVADA, USA:  The Democratic Process

NEVADA, USA: The Democratic Process

Here in the States, it’s election time. That glorious time of year when you can’t turn on the television or the radio or open your mailbox or drive down the street without being bombarded with all the VOTE FOR ME advertisements.

I hate this time of year.

The election signs make our neighborhood look trashy, the mail just gets tossed so it’s a waste of paper, and my Facebook timeline is filled with arguments about whose candidate is better for America (or Nevada, when it comes to local elections). People get mean. Vicious. And it makes everyone just seem ignorant.

It’s also the one time, every four years, when I’m forced to rethink my stance on everything. I question everything I believe in. And, I wonder, with how ill-informed I feel most of the time when it comes to politics, how will I ever be able to teach  my child how to make his own decisions when it comes to our democratic process? (more…)

Roxanne (USA)

Roxanne is a single mother to a 9-year-old superhero (who was born 7 weeks premature), living in the biggest little city and blogging all about her journey at Unintentionally Brilliant. She works as a Program Coordinator for the NevadaTeach program at the University of Nevada, Reno. Roxanne has a B.A. in English from Sierra Nevada College. She has about 5 novels in progress and dreams about completing one before her son goes to high school.

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UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: Doing the dirty work…or not

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: Doing the dirty work…or not

A friend came to our apartment the other day and said “Wow, your place is always so clean!”

I looked at her. “Well, I pay someone,” I said. “Duh.”

Until we moved to Abu Dhabi, I’d never had someone clean my house. I didn’t grow up with “help,” although I imagine my mother sometimes felt like the underpaid scullery maid.  I went to a friend’s house for a holiday weekend once, in college, and when we got there, her mother said that if I needed something ironed, I should just leave it out “for the girl”. I was confused: the only other woman in the house was a middle-aged African American woman.  I wore a wrinkled shirt to the party.

All of which is to say, until I hit forty-seven  recently, I was my own domestic help.

Don’t worry, I’m not going to re-hash The Help; instead I’m writing about how strange — and dangerously seductive — it is to live suddenly in a world where “help” – and lots of it – is readily available, even to people like me, who in the scheme of things don’t make that much money. (more…)

Mannahattamamma (UAE)

After twenty-plus years in Manhattan, Deborah Quinn and her family moved to Abu Dhabi (in the United Arab Emirates), where she spends a great deal of time driving her sons back and forth to soccer practice. She writes about travel, politics, feminism, education, and the absurdities of living in a place where temperatures regularly go above 110F.
Deborah can also be found on her blog, Mannahattamamma.

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United Arab Emirates:  How Much Tuition is Ten Toes?

United Arab Emirates: How Much Tuition is Ten Toes?

There’s a conversation that happens in expat-land that sounds a bit like what prisoners in a jail yard might say to one another:

“what brought you here?how long have you been here? when are you leaving?”

Sometimes people answer these questions with slumped shoulders and a shake of the head, which usually means that a) they’ve been here in Abu Dhabi for far too long and aren’t leaving any time soon; or b) they just got here and still haven’t figured out the basics, like getting the vegetables weighed in the produce section before they get in the checkout line.

The most cheerful answer I’ve gotten thus far to these questions has been from a woman named Janice, who is here from the Philippines.  Her good cheer surprised me because at the time of our conversation, she was energetically applying a pumice to my heels.  (more…)

Mannahattamamma (UAE)

After twenty-plus years in Manhattan, Deborah Quinn and her family moved to Abu Dhabi (in the United Arab Emirates), where she spends a great deal of time driving her sons back and forth to soccer practice. She writes about travel, politics, feminism, education, and the absurdities of living in a place where temperatures regularly go above 110F.
Deborah can also be found on her blog, Mannahattamamma.

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MASSACHUSETTS, USA: Too Much

I’m half-way through reading my six-year-old The Little House in the Big Woods, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. If you grew up in America in the 1970s and ’80s like I did, you’re no doubt familiar with the popular TV series, Little House on the Prairie, based on Wilder’s books.

Both series recount life in the American pioneering days of the late-1800s, when homesteading was a common way of life and surviving meant living off the land.

I have always loved reading to my daughter and talking about books together but this book has been a particular conversation piece.

The premise of the book discusses life for a family living far from any modern (1860’s) conveniences. It describes in detail how they did things, like smoked meat and stored food for the winter, loaded a musket for hunting, or slaughtered a pig, and how each day of the week had a specific designation: “Wash on Monday, Iron on Tuesday, Mend on Wednesday, Churn on Thursday, Clean on Friday, Bake on Saturday, Rest on Sunday.”

Aside from needing to explain to my child what many of these tasks are—some of which neither I nor most of my friends even do anymore—it really made me stop and consider (more…)

Kyla P'an (Portugal)

Kyla was born in suburban Philadelphia but spent most of her time growing up in New England. She took her first big, solo-trip at age 14, when she traveled to visit a friend on a small Greek island. Since then, travels have included: three months on the European rails, three years studying and working in Japan, and nine months taking the slow route back from Japan to the US when she was done. In addition to her work as Managing Editor of World Moms Network, Kyla is a freelance writer, copy editor, recovering triathlete and occasional blogger. Until recently, she and her husband resided outside of Boston, Massachusetts, where they were raising two spunky kids, two frisky cats, a snail, a fish and a snake. They now live outside of Lisbon, Portugal with two spunky teens and three frisky cats. You can read more about Kyla’s outlook on the world and parenting on her personal blogs, Growing Muses And Muses Where We Go

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MASSACHUSETTS, USA: Too Much

I’m half-way through reading my six-year-old The Little House in the Big Woods, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. If you grew up in America in the 1970s and ’80s like I did, you’re no doubt familiar with the popular TV series, Little House on the Prairie, based on Wilder’s books.

Both series recount life in the American pioneering days of the late-1800s, when homesteading was a common way of life and surviving meant living off the land.

I have always loved reading to my daughter and talking about books together but this book has been a particular conversation piece.

The premise of the book discusses life for a family living far from any modern (1860’s) conveniences. It describes in detail how they did things, like smoked meat and stored food for the winter, loaded a musket for hunting, or slaughtered a pig, and how each day of the week had a specific designation: “Wash on Monday, Iron on Tuesday, Mend on Wednesday, Churn on Thursday, Clean on Friday, Bake on Saturday, Rest on Sunday.”

Aside from needing to explain to my child what many of these tasks are—some of which neither I nor most of my friends even do anymore—it really made me stop and consider (more…)

Kyla P'an (Portugal)

Kyla was born in suburban Philadelphia but spent most of her time growing up in New England. She took her first big, solo-trip at age 14, when she traveled to visit a friend on a small Greek island. Since then, travels have included: three months on the European rails, three years studying and working in Japan, and nine months taking the slow route back from Japan to the US when she was done. In addition to her work as Managing Editor of World Moms Network, Kyla is a freelance writer, copy editor, recovering triathlete and occasional blogger. Until recently, she and her husband resided outside of Boston, Massachusetts, where they were raising two spunky kids, two frisky cats, a snail, a fish and a snake. They now live outside of Lisbon, Portugal with two spunky teens and three frisky cats. You can read more about Kyla’s outlook on the world and parenting on her personal blogs, Growing Muses And Muses Where We Go

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