JAPAN: Double Jeopardy

JAPAN: Double Jeopardy

Ever feel like you're walking on cultural egg shells?

Ever feel like you’re walking on cultural egg shells?

Sometimes it can get confusing, trying to navigate waters made murky where cultures collide. Whatever choice you make will seem wrong to someone. Whatever you say will offend someone. No matter how lightly you step, you risk making someone feel walked over.

And that is the situation I find myself in again, as the air turns cooler (finally!) and Japanese schoolchildren begin to practice en masse for their sports festivals.

My brother is getting married, half a world away, at the exact same time my daughter is supposed to perform in her final sports festival at kindergarten.

If you are in North America, or Europe, or very likely anywhere except Japan, your response is probably, “So what?” But if you are a mother of a Japanese child, I’ll give you a moment to remove the hand you’ve placed over your mouth in horror. Breathe in. Breathe out. Let’s continue.

It doesn’t matter much which I choose for us to attend. Half of my children’s relatives will be angry about our choice. How can you miss your sibling’s wedding? How can you deny your aging in-laws their last chance to see a preschool sports festival, where the last-year students are the stars of the show?

“How could you do that to your child? She will miss out.”

Says everyone from every side.

Sometimes being part of a bi-racial, bi-cultural, bilingual family means making the hard calls. What is important in one culture is not in another. What is optional in one culture is imperative in another.

I find myself, again and again and again, struggling to find a balance between traditions and beliefs. I fall off the high-wire more than I care to admit.

But on those occasions when you can do that perfect, tip-toed, pirouette, it is beautiful. It is breathtaking. It is worth it.

This time, though?

I better bring a helmet because I’m bound to fall flat on my face, whatever I choose.

Have you faced difficult decisions because of cultural or religious differences within your family? How do you find a balance between them?

This is an original post by World Moms Blog contributor, Melanie Oda in Japan, of Hamakko Mommy

Photo credit to FeeBeeDee.  This photo has a creative commons attribution license. 

Melanie Oda (Japan)

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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WORLD TOUR: Mindi in Belgium

WORLD TOUR: Mindi in Belgium

mindi

“An American Toddler in (not quite) Paris”

It’s 2 P.M. and my toddler is tuckered out and ready for his nap; and—let’s be honest—I’m ready for some coffee and couch time. However, there is one small problem; the neighborhood organ grinder has set up shop right outside our apartment.

Welcome to life in Brussels, Belgium.

There are obvious differences between living in the U.S. and living in Belgium; a royal family, socialized medicine, and Nutella encouraged as breakfast fare, just to name a few. But raising an American toddler here in Belgium has brought out some of the more unanticipated nuances between our home country and temporarily adopted one.

The differences between the U.S. and Belgium are by no means all negative. We will soon be taking our son to Paris for his third visit; he regularly has play dates with pals from Italy; Australia, Denmark, Sweden, Germany and Russia; and he’s a big fan of Pellegrino — all of which would probably not be the case if we were still in the U.S. But, discovering the differences between our old home and new one adds a little levity to the challenge of raising our son across the ocean from most of our friends and family.

It’s finally summer in Brussels, which means swimming—albeit indoors since it’s rarely hot enough to swim outside. Just like in the States, there are plenty of pools to take your kid to, but there is one difference that never fails to delight me about swimming in Belgium. Everyone, even your bald as a cue ball baby, is required to wear a swim cap. So out of all the things that can come out of babies and end up in the pool, people in Belgium are most concerned about hair. Très Bien!

The language differences are always entertaining. One of my son’s go-to activities while we walk around Brussels is to point out people who are wearing glasses, by yelling, aptly, “glasses!” as they pass by. This is all well and good, except for the fact that the way he says it makes it sound more like, “ca ca” i.e. the French word for ‘poo’. It’s probably not hard to imagine the looks you get from strangers when your kid yells ‘poo’ and points enthusiastically at them. Merde!

Once during a walk, a woman (who wasn’t wearing glasses, mercifully) said something to my son that sounded like, “mechant”, a French word meaning “mean or bad.” I was all set to spew forth my best French insults when I realized she had actually said, “il chant”, meaning, “he’s singing” and in fact, he was. Our little guy loves to sing and play music; so much so that we just might make an organ grinder out of him yet.

This is an original post to World Moms Blog by Mindi, an American expat who has been living in Brussels, Belgium for the past 5 years with her rocket scientist/cycling journalist husband and toddler son. Mindi is a professional social worker, amateur cultural anthropologist and failing French student who loves Belgian waffles, mussels, and absurdity, and who misses American bagels, mint chocolate chip ice cream, and pragmatism. Mindi’s son tweets his daily displeasures at: twitter.com/Parler_Toddler.

Photo credit to the author. 

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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SOUTH KOREA: Sleepless in Seoul

SOUTH KOREA: Sleepless in Seoul

My little one is finally sleeping through the night for the most part. I never thought this day would come. You may remember one of my very first posts with World Moms Blog in which I bemoaned the sleep deprivation that comes with a newborn. Now that he’s sleeping, you’d think that I would be well-rested, but unfortunately a year of constant sleep interruption seems to have led to a bit of a sleeping problem. I’m fortunate if I get 4-6 consecutive hours these days.

I was feeling very sorry for myself until I recently met a school teacher here in Seoul who told me that the kids she teaches in primary school are getting about the same amount. Reflecting back on my pre-pubescent school days I remembered a strict 8pm bedtime and a 7am alarm clock. That’s 11 hours of sleep. After school I had to do my homework and chores, and then I was free to play until dinnertime.

Here in Seoul and in other parts of Korea parents are incredibly invested, monetarily and otherwise, in the education of their children. Academic success is crucial. Many children attend public school from early morning to mid-afternoon, after which they go to an academy, called a hagwon, where they often stay until 9 or 10pm. Yes, you read that right. (more…)

Ms. V. (South Korea)

Ms. V returned from a 3-year stint in Seoul, South Korea and is now living in the US in the beautiful Pacific Northwest with her partner, their two kids, three ferocious felines, and a dog named Avon Barksdale. She grew up all over the US, mostly along the east coast, but lived in New York City longer than anywhere else, so considers NYC “home.” Her love of travel has taken her all over the world and to all but four of the 50 states. Ms. V is contemplative and sacred activist, exploring the intersection of yoga, new monasticism, feminism and social change. She is the co-director and co-founder of Samdhana-Karana Yoga: A Healing Arts Center, a non-profit yoga studio and the spiritual director for Hab Community. While not marveling at her beautiful children, she enjoys reading, cooking, and has dreams of one day sleeping again.

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Join our Global Twitter Parties This Thursday!!!

GLOBAL TWITTER PARTIES!

Ever wonder how mothers around the world do things?

Our international contributors will be signing into Twitter to discuss:

“Differences in Motherhood

Around the World”

Thursday, May 10, 2012

7-8am EST (US/NYC)

AND

7-8pm EST (US/NYC)

Go to tweetchat.com hash tag: #worldmomsblog

Not sure what time that is where you live? Go to the World Clock to be on time!

 


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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KENYA: Are French Parents Really Superior?

A few days ago a good friend sent me this article provokingly titled “Why French Parenting is Superior” Maybe you’ve read it? I’m a bit out of the loop here in Western Kenya, but I’m assuming it’s getting a lot of attention because even my 24 year-old male colleague had heard of it.

Anyway, the article starts off with the author’s observation, after several years living and raising kids in France, that French kids are simply better behaved. They sit quietly at the table, acquiesce to parents’ demands and know how to play peacefully by themselves. This is laid out in stark contrast to the tantrums and power struggles seen all over American playgrounds.

So, what’s going on here?

First, the author asserts that the French view their role more as “educators” than “disciplinarians,” which gives them more patience and a slightly different perspective in the face of tantrums.

In addition, French parents simply “lay down the law” a bit more firmly, but still lovingly. (more…)

Mama Mzungu (Kenya)

Originally from Chicago, Kim has dabbled in world travel through her 20s and is finally realizing her dream of living and working in Western Kenya with her husband and two small boys, Caleb and Emmet. She writes about tension of looking at what the family left in the US and feeling like they live a relatively simple life, and then looking at their neighbors and feeling embarrassed by their riches. She writes about clumsily navigating the inevitable cultural differences and learning every day that we share more than we don’t. Come visit her at Mama Mzungu.

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