-^-for posterity-^-

there was interenational women’s day. that was about a half a year ago. that was the day a woman drove past me on her motorbike with her husband sitting behind and yelled, ‘i’m liberated!’

tomorrow is vietnamese woman’s day. we talked to the girls in some of our classes and the girls felt they were completely liberated. they were equal to men. i wondered if that was true anywhere.

when a girl gets married in vietnam they must live with the parents of the groom. they move into this foreign house and live and work until they raise enough money to buy their own house. they live with their mother-in-law and take all directions from them. the mother-in-law is the boss and the new wife must obey.

women here have two jobs. they are in charge of raising the children and, in today’s world, they must have a paying job. women rarely go out with friends and, after a hard day’s work, they must cook. this isn’t a society of ordering out. the food must be bought at the market, brought home and prepared from scratch.

women generally work harder than men in both societies. women generally are not able to rise to the same levels of power as men. in our western society, we feel we are fairly equitable but, in reality, where do we see women actually leading? laura bush going to russia to read books? is that leadership? sure, we have some higher ranking women in government but they are normally placed in marginal positions. our true leaders have always been male and, i’m sure, will always be male.