Gender equality does NOT mean role reversal
Just occurred to me: now that women have the same choices as men, why do so many of us chose to “pick up men’s bad habits”?
Side by side, at the summit.
Women used to loathe men that don’t pick up after themselves, can’t cook/clean or do housework, don’t have a style, work too much , not family oriented etc. Now that women have been empowered to work in many male-dominated fields & been phenomenally good at it, why do so many of us think being a modern empowered woman mean that we should behave more like the stereotypically flawed men? Why did we drop everything “womanly” & picked up the bad traits that we hated in our father’s & grandfather’s generations? Since when being a woman became a bad thing? Are we being sexist against ourselves now? Women fought so hard to have the opportunities to be a better version of ourselves, instead we became a worse version of someone else!
I am absolutely passionate about encouraging girls/women to reach their potential in Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics. But not at a price that we sacrifice good manners, solid life skills, personal style, personal hygiene, housekeeping skills & caring of people in general. I believe in gender equality, not a complete role reversal of gender stereotypes. To be a balanced human being, we need both so-called masculine & feminine traits; both logic & emotion. Men & women may differ on the proportions of each in their personality mix, but isn’t that what makes us individuals? How about we evaluate a personality trait as positive or negative based on the person, rather than rushing to assign a “gender” to it? I’ve met many men who do well in their careers AND they can cook and dress well, and before you get all cynical on me, no they are not all gay. I’m beginning to think so many men can cook & do house work because so many women, well… can’t! So if these men adapted to both work & home life, why don’t us women?
Being who we are is liberating, regardless of gender. We are not limited by gender stereotypes anymore, so don’t let our misguided need to be “completely opposite” pin us into another suffocating corner across the room which still doesn’t make us happy because that’s not who we really are. Evaluate what ACTUALLY makes us happy, and not what we perceive as the things that the society believes that should make us happy. So to all the stay-at-home moms and the career women out there, if your chosen lifestyle makes YOU happy, then bravo! You made the right choice for yourself, despite the reception you got from your peers.
On a related note, my mother was wrong about career women shouldn’t learn to cook. Cooking has been a total blast for the past few months, in a mad scientist sort of way. Besides, what can be better than to eat the foods you love anytime you want to at home, instead of being limited to your favorite restaurants’ business hours? 
Now that I’ve gotten all that off of my chest, I have to go finish building a database cluster and have some more kitchen experiments for lunch!
Saddle Sore 1000? Bring it!
So my co-worker who luhhhhhhves motorcycles has been trying to get me out on a ride with him & his friends for a while now. While they all sounded cool, I’ve never had the time to do such ’road trips’. Regardless, talks about the route maps, the possible stops, the food along the way, the riders personalities, the types of bike each one had so on & so forth pretty much dominates every conversation I have with him. I swear I’m living vicariously through his road trips & researches. The other day, he asked if I know about the Iron Butt Association & a few of their challenges called Saddle Sore & Bun Burner. I have never heard of those things & decided to Bing it 
This is the obligatory 1st post of 2010!
I have to say arriving at the door of 2010 healthy, happy and living in Hawaii is really quite mind boggling to me! The fact that I have not been run over by a bus or some other ridiculous way to die is an accomplishment already. Even though I did have to pull out a few knives from my back, catch the wind that was knocked out of me & get the rug back to under my feet… then again who doesn’t have to do that every once in a while?
Since it’s the 1st post of 2010, you know it just HAD to be something about New Years Resolution. My 2010 resolutions/goals were sent out in a tweet, like so many of my random thoughts:
The People We Meet and The People We Keep
Friends?
About two years ago, I was reading the book The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier. The story was built on the idea that each of us go through two deaths: The 1st is when we die physically, we end up in a place called The City; when the last living person that remembers us dies that’s when we go through the 2nd death & leave The City. So you can live in The City for as long as there’s a living person that remembers you. The Story went on that there was only one last person left alive on earth after a pandemic wiped out everyone else & all the people she remembers were gathered in The City realizing that they all have this one friend/family/ex-lover/co-worker/neighbor/acquaintance in common, which was why they were still left in The City when it suddenly emptied out. (The book was an interesting read, probably would make a cool movie… though the screenplay would be quite difficult to adapt because the style that the book was written in.)
So the idea in the book prompted the question “What makes the people we meet, the people we keep?”
Testing post by email
why? cuz it’s there, and I can.
So there!
Procrastination –> Overwhelming backlog
That about summed it up for my lack up updates here!
So many awesome trips & food, not shared w/ the world yet. Not that the world needs yet ANOTHER blog post about travel and/or food, but it’s still nice to have them documented so I can look back on them later. Oh well. Moving on!
Whenever I have time (probably not anytime soon), I shall complete my updates on the trips to Vegas & Italy. Both involved fabulous food & fun. However, since I’m trying to move on, I’m going to look forward to the following events & have them posted in a more timely fashion.
I’m looking forward to two events in Seattle next week: Dinner at the Herb Farm & attending the opening night performance La Traviata (Seattle Opera production). I have been looking forward to these for months, one more week to go! I never pack for my trips any earlier than the night before… sometimes even the day of departure, but this time I want to pack RIGHT NOW!
Is it next week yet?
La Dolce Vita
I love Italy, ask anyone who knows me & they’ll tell you exactly that. I went to Italy in 1999, backpacked it on my own for two weeks in Milan, Rome, Florence & Venice and I was head over heels for it. I was so close to canceling my return flight & just stay there (my senses returned to me in time since I don’t speak Italian, and had a job to go back to in Vancouver).
I’m not saying that I love all things Italian, I don’t; I don’t speak Italian, Italian products don’t particularly catch my eyes more than others, and I don’t prefer Italians over people of any other nationalities. I love Italy, the country. I love *being* there. I love the food, the wine, the coffee, the gelato, the olive oil, the cheese, the pancetta (yes, I realize that it’s all food related so far), the language, the people. the museum, the arts, the music, the architecture, the history… a complete sensory overload, in a VERY good way. As crazy as it may sound, I love being in a brand new place where I don’t know anyone or have preconceived notion about anything, every day there is a new adventure & discovery. The fact that I don’t speak the local language is even better, I get to observe & not expected to talk to anyone. After I got home, I told everyone I knew that I would go back to Italy some day very soon, I wanted to live there… well, as life often plays tricks with ones plans, ”very soon” turn into 10 years . Something had to be done about this, since I backpacked the last trip & really didn’t plan well enough to see any performances in the great opera houses, I decided that this time I’m going in style. That was why I signed up for the “2009 Gala Italy Festivals Tour” by International Curtain Call.
Right now, I’m in Verona. I thought I’ll update my very neglected blog with some of my travel details so I can share with my friends & re-live it after the trip is over. Let me just catch up on the trip so far, since the real tours will start Friday morning…
My quest for the right work phone led me to HTC Touch Pro
(ME: “I’m not asking for a pretty phone, I just want a phone that works.”)
My first HTC phone came at the heel of an agonizing 6 months with a Palm Treo 650. (ME: “This is sooo not working for me! We’re done. It’s not me, it’s you!” TREO: *crash*)
The bright side was before the Treo, I didn’t really know what I wanted in a work phone other than to use it to make/receive calls. Treo 650 opened my eyes to all the things I did NOT want in a PDA phone and that in turn helped me narrowed down the “Want List”:
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The ability to sync with Exchange Server directly without external service.
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The ability to remotely wipe the device when lost or stolen.
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To view/edit MS Office documents and spreadsheets.
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Bigger screen: I don’t want to scroll forever or squint.
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RDP client: in the odd chance that I need to Remote Desktop to something.
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Full QWERTY: I don’t text much, but I need to compose emails longer than a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ reply.
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Reasonable battery life, it should at least last a full day.
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Less crashy. (In 6 months, Verizon sent me 3 different Treos, and all of them were crashy.)
An Old Letter
I found a letter I wrote 20 yrs ago to my mom… I was using big words & trying to sound so grown up in it Funny child.
Anyway, there was a Hepatitis A outbreak in Shanghai in early 1988, due to contaminated clams. (which turn into a problem because people in Shanghai liked to eat clams raw) This letter was written during that time.
———— START TRANSLATION ———–
Gypsy Raven
