Thursday, 7 August 2008
Bush's criticism of China's HR crimes...
It's a good start and a good thing that Bush brings up China's different human rights crimes and that he emphasises that the people in China deserves the basic rights that are all persons' rights. However, this is only a first step as there are many other countries out there who deserves the same criticism, especially perhaps Israel who have Bush and the US full support, and the US itself where Guantanamo has showed how far from this thinking of basic rights being universal the Americans really are. As the Swedish expression say, you should not throw rocks when you're in a glass house... meaning, that before criticising someone else's behaviour look into your own to make sure you're not engaging in similar behaviour yourself.
Wednesday, 23 July 2008
Divorces = an evil for the children?
Read this article today about divorces and how they influence children. The opinion article argues that divorces are bad for children in all relationships where the parents do not engage in explicit fights or violence. As the latter only supposedly make up about 1/3 of divorcees, in general divorces should be avoided and the state work for helping couples to stay together. Children to divorced parents apparently suffer from more troubles growing up, with tendencies to start smoking more easily, not get as well educated as children where parents stay together, have more problems making friends etc.
Although the article has some good arguments and the writers make sure to emphasis in the last lines that the society should not make divorces more difficult nor should single-parents be blamed, there is still something about it that make me want to scream... or at least write a blog input about it ;)
My first reaction is that the children of divorced parents that I have met have succeeded as well as those whose parents are still together. There life might have been a bit more difficult in times - missing one parent, not trusting relationships as easily (but then again, why is this considered a bad thing?) and so on - but these difficulties have often made them into stronger persons.
My own experience was to thank my parents for having gotten a divorce! Their relationship was unliveable at the end - for everyone including my brother and me who, like most children, directly felt when our parents were sad or angry with each other, even when they did not fight in front of us. You can feel the lack of love, of patience, of want to stay living together and it makes the atmosphere at home quite heavy indeed. My parents also fought sometimes in front of us, so I guess that should put my experience within the range of 1/3 of children to fighting divorced couples.
However, what couple - where the love has run out, where you want to continue with your life without the other person but where you stay on just for the sake of the children - what couple in that situation would never fight? Living with someone is often quite complicated, and if you don't have love to smoothen down things, how do you pass over all those small things that irritates you without ever fighting? I must say that I highly doubt that 2/3 of children of divorces had parents who never verbally fought... If this is the case, then perhaps it is because the parents were smart enough to get divorced once they realised that they weren't meant to stay together, rather than staying on for the sake of it and getting into one fight after another as you do... Perhaps there are other ways of making divorcee children fit better into a smooth life than trying to enforce marriages to go on once the love has died out. I would guess that one of the reasons why they get into trouble more often is rather due to the lack of money in many single-household families than to the fact that the parents have chosen to live their lives...?
Finally, I don't see why the state should get involved in this very private matter and I can't see why two people should stay together after their love is gone just for their children. Children are extremely important, but not at the cost of all the happiness of their parents. And people should be allowed to be happy and I have always believed that happy parents (whether it means parents that get divorced, parents that go back to work quite early as they feel better that way, or that want to stay at home for the first 10 years or so, parents that live their lives while still providing for their children) make happier children. Me for one, was happier once my parents divorced and they could calm down, be happy and become friends, going on living the lives that they preferred. Having my father moving back across the continent was very difficult, but for me not linked that much to the divorce as to his homesickness. In short, I am what you could call a happy child of divorced parents and recommend getting a divorce to anyone if the relationship doesn't work anymore.
My last 2 cents before leaving for holiday tomorrow, to see my mother and family in Sweden and to perhaps thank my mother again for having taken the necessary step to render the lives of her, my father, my brother and me so much more simple and happy. To be honest, I am quite sure that my brother and I would probably have had more problems growing up if my parents had stayed together.
Although the article has some good arguments and the writers make sure to emphasis in the last lines that the society should not make divorces more difficult nor should single-parents be blamed, there is still something about it that make me want to scream... or at least write a blog input about it ;)
My first reaction is that the children of divorced parents that I have met have succeeded as well as those whose parents are still together. There life might have been a bit more difficult in times - missing one parent, not trusting relationships as easily (but then again, why is this considered a bad thing?) and so on - but these difficulties have often made them into stronger persons.
My own experience was to thank my parents for having gotten a divorce! Their relationship was unliveable at the end - for everyone including my brother and me who, like most children, directly felt when our parents were sad or angry with each other, even when they did not fight in front of us. You can feel the lack of love, of patience, of want to stay living together and it makes the atmosphere at home quite heavy indeed. My parents also fought sometimes in front of us, so I guess that should put my experience within the range of 1/3 of children to fighting divorced couples.
However, what couple - where the love has run out, where you want to continue with your life without the other person but where you stay on just for the sake of the children - what couple in that situation would never fight? Living with someone is often quite complicated, and if you don't have love to smoothen down things, how do you pass over all those small things that irritates you without ever fighting? I must say that I highly doubt that 2/3 of children of divorces had parents who never verbally fought... If this is the case, then perhaps it is because the parents were smart enough to get divorced once they realised that they weren't meant to stay together, rather than staying on for the sake of it and getting into one fight after another as you do... Perhaps there are other ways of making divorcee children fit better into a smooth life than trying to enforce marriages to go on once the love has died out. I would guess that one of the reasons why they get into trouble more often is rather due to the lack of money in many single-household families than to the fact that the parents have chosen to live their lives...?
Finally, I don't see why the state should get involved in this very private matter and I can't see why two people should stay together after their love is gone just for their children. Children are extremely important, but not at the cost of all the happiness of their parents. And people should be allowed to be happy and I have always believed that happy parents (whether it means parents that get divorced, parents that go back to work quite early as they feel better that way, or that want to stay at home for the first 10 years or so, parents that live their lives while still providing for their children) make happier children. Me for one, was happier once my parents divorced and they could calm down, be happy and become friends, going on living the lives that they preferred. Having my father moving back across the continent was very difficult, but for me not linked that much to the divorce as to his homesickness. In short, I am what you could call a happy child of divorced parents and recommend getting a divorce to anyone if the relationship doesn't work anymore.
My last 2 cents before leaving for holiday tomorrow, to see my mother and family in Sweden and to perhaps thank my mother again for having taken the necessary step to render the lives of her, my father, my brother and me so much more simple and happy. To be honest, I am quite sure that my brother and I would probably have had more problems growing up if my parents had stayed together.
Monday, 21 July 2008
me - an environmental threat?
Was just thinking about all my planned trips this year around the world, well mostly around Europe, but with one trip to China also planned. Was thinking about the trips with a big smile as feeling all happy about all the places I'll visit, the time I'll get to spend with family and so on. And then suddenly it kind of hit me that with all these flights I'm really not helping the environment :(
So how do you make the two ends meet? How do I continue to dream about travelling the world without destroying too much of it? How do I continue to work in a country other than the 2 where different parts of my family lives without going back all the time and hence being bad for the environment? How do I work in an organisation which is trying to make the world a safer and better place, but where half the staff travel 40% of the time?... So far I have some excuses - like the fact that at least Geneva is in between Sweden and Slovenia so I don't have to travel that far each time, and would still need to travel between the 2 countries to see both my parents... And some small solutions like paying the extra fee for environmental tax on my last flight ticket (only cost about 5 CHF for my flight Geneva-Stockholm-Geneva and made me feel a bit better), take the train to Paris in September, when I'm then flying to Beijing from there... And this year, I only flew once for work - better than all the years before although not by my own choice. And I almost always walk to work, or go by rollerblades. Sometimes I do take the bus, and sometimes I go with N's car or scooter, but most of the time I walk. However, one flight seems to cancel all the other effort. And this year might be one of the worst for my personal flights so far. Judge yourselves and let me know if you have any good tips for how to allow for both travelling and living environmentally friendly?
This year in numbers of flights:
2 flights Geneva - Stockholm and back
1 flight Geneva - Lisbon and back
2 flights Geneva - Barcelona and back
1 flight Paris - Beijing and back
1 flight Geneva - Belgrade and back (for work)
???
So how do you make the two ends meet? How do I continue to dream about travelling the world without destroying too much of it? How do I continue to work in a country other than the 2 where different parts of my family lives without going back all the time and hence being bad for the environment? How do I work in an organisation which is trying to make the world a safer and better place, but where half the staff travel 40% of the time?... So far I have some excuses - like the fact that at least Geneva is in between Sweden and Slovenia so I don't have to travel that far each time, and would still need to travel between the 2 countries to see both my parents... And some small solutions like paying the extra fee for environmental tax on my last flight ticket (only cost about 5 CHF for my flight Geneva-Stockholm-Geneva and made me feel a bit better), take the train to Paris in September, when I'm then flying to Beijing from there... And this year, I only flew once for work - better than all the years before although not by my own choice. And I almost always walk to work, or go by rollerblades. Sometimes I do take the bus, and sometimes I go with N's car or scooter, but most of the time I walk. However, one flight seems to cancel all the other effort. And this year might be one of the worst for my personal flights so far. Judge yourselves and let me know if you have any good tips for how to allow for both travelling and living environmentally friendly?
This year in numbers of flights:
2 flights Geneva - Stockholm and back
1 flight Geneva - Lisbon and back
2 flights Geneva - Barcelona and back
1 flight Paris - Beijing and back
1 flight Geneva - Belgrade and back (for work)
???
Saturday's recipe
1 cuddly morning in bed
2 handfuls of mixed fruits for breakfast
2 filled cups of sailing on a windy, sunny day among friends
3 spoons of rollerblading down by the lake
a sprinkle of swimming in the lake
1 serving of mixed sushi
1/2 a bottle of excellent white wine from our wine tasting trip in May
1 big serving of laughter
1 handful of sunset against a cloudy sky
love, kisses and cuddles after taste
1-2 overfull glasses of wine offered by a russian group that like to speak a lot!
if possible - rollerblading back down by the lake, N trying to keep upright on his rollers, me rollerblading while bending over double of laughter
= happiness
2 handfuls of mixed fruits for breakfast
2 filled cups of sailing on a windy, sunny day among friends
3 spoons of rollerblading down by the lake
a sprinkle of swimming in the lake
1 serving of mixed sushi
1/2 a bottle of excellent white wine from our wine tasting trip in May
1 big serving of laughter
1 handful of sunset against a cloudy sky
love, kisses and cuddles after taste
1-2 overfull glasses of wine offered by a russian group that like to speak a lot!
if possible - rollerblading back down by the lake, N trying to keep upright on his rollers, me rollerblading while bending over double of laughter
= happiness
Friday, 18 July 2008
today's recipe
Ingredients:
about 4 caipi's the day before
1 sangria
a little sprinkle of food only
a bit short on the sleep
a handful of quite crappy music
1 cup of good friendship
= a smile and a bit of a hangover.... luckily it's friday, the sun is shining and I found some nice rice and mais crackers to eat for breakfast - calming down the sloushing effect from the alcohol...
tonight i think we'll go to the parc for a free concert - looks cool :)
about 4 caipi's the day before
1 sangria
a little sprinkle of food only
a bit short on the sleep
a handful of quite crappy music
1 cup of good friendship
= a smile and a bit of a hangover.... luckily it's friday, the sun is shining and I found some nice rice and mais crackers to eat for breakfast - calming down the sloushing effect from the alcohol...
tonight i think we'll go to the parc for a free concert - looks cool :)
Thursday, 17 July 2008
today's recipe
Ingredients:
1 airline starting a direct cheap fligth geneva - stockholm
2 weeks of christmas in stockholm booked
1 happy mum
a little bit of money only
= a big smile :)
1 airline starting a direct cheap fligth geneva - stockholm
2 weeks of christmas in stockholm booked
1 happy mum
a little bit of money only
= a big smile :)
Wednesday, 16 July 2008
photos from "la rue est à vous"
A bit late since it took place in May, but here are some cool photos from an event where they closed of several of the streets from traffic in my neighbourhood and lots of small happenings were going on with concerts, theater for kids etc...
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