The Shared Care podcast is part of the CAREdiZO campaign for gender equality in caregiving and the workplace. In the fourth episode, Valentin Atanasov is a guest. Listen to the conversation here https://open.spotify.com/episode/3jL68J9xMjOAQEhCMZ9Po8?si=E5pdr6KcRyC4YlbI1Wd_xg 

 

Transcript - epizod 4

 

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Here we are in the new episode of the podcast Shared Care. In it, we discuss gender equality in care responsibilities at home. The podcast is part of the CAREdiZO project, through which we give more voice to the problems that arise from the uneven distribution of care work. In this episode, we will talk about care and its value in society. Of course, we also have a suitable specialist with whom we will explore the topic. This is the psychologist and journalist Valentin Atanasov.

Welcome! Care is everyday life, we can see it everywhere around us, but do we fully understand its essence? What does it really mean to care? How would you describe care? Is it an emotional act, an obligation or a social responsibility?

Hello to you and your listeners. Thank you for the invitation to discuss a truly important and extensive topic that does not have one, two, or three answers. What does it really mean to care? It means to love, to give of ourselves. Because the word care, translated into Bulgarian, means love. Care is an emotional act that consumes us both physically, emotionally, and mentally. Care is the highest manifestation of love for our neighbor, for the person next to us, for the suffering, the helpless. So we can describe care as both an obligation and a social responsibility. A responsibility that until the 1970s was given only to women. She was to be the person who raised, who cared. And the father was pushed, as I like to say, into a corner somewhere. He worked long hours to bring home money to provide for his family.

That is, care is a responsibility of society, an obligation that we assume as citizens in society.

Let us now comment on the gender bias in providing care. From the statistics that we collected during our project, it turns out that in our country there is still a large imbalance between the sexes in housework. For example, cooking, cleaning, maintaining the home and garden, also raising and educating children is the main concern of women. Why is care most often associated with women? What are the reasons for the formation of such expectations in society?

We are raised from a young age what is a woman's job and what is a man's job. This division exists in us and is passed on, if you will, from generation to generation. A woman should raise the children, a woman should do the housework, a woman should shop, a woman should definitely clean, and if a man decides to clean the house without her, this is considered something exceptional. If a woman does it, it is something normal. If a man does it, it is something that deserves praise, it deserves to be talked about, to be highlighted. It is the same thing, and a man is always given more value if he does it. If a mother takes the child out, it is in the order of things. If the husband pushes the stroller, it is "wow." And people always note it, comment on it, emphasize it, and in this way the man receives greater appreciation and feels more significant for something that is quite normal for him to do.

So society only creates these double standards in terms of assessments of care. This is an interesting fact, especially since research in Bulgaria shows that over 3 quarters of people, men and women, believe that children, for example, are primarily the woman's responsibility, not men's. Or that men have the financial responsibility for supporting their family, in confirmation of your words.

Okay, and what is the burden of this unfair distribution of roles?

When a woman takes care of her family, she suffers a lot of deprivation. She gives up her career. She can't always stay until the end of the working day, because she gets called from school or the hospital and is constantly expecting something to happen. She neglects herself. She neglects her rest, we can even say so, because exhausted from work, she goes home and another working day begins for her. If she has children, this working day continues even when they fall asleep, and she continues to take care of them, preparing them for the next day. If we assume that they are sick, she stays by their bedside until they wake up, listening to whether they are breathing, because I have such a case in my practice, in my communication with ladies. When they come to me, afraid that something bad might happen to their child who is sick. This fear, this stress accumulates. Or another mother who tells me, I carry my child in my arms all night, because when I put him to bed, he starts coughing and wakes up. Here is such care, which, however, no one seems to appreciate, and care that is not paid for. And that is why in America they have taken the trouble to calculate how much this work costs when we take care of a sick person. And if you value it, you get to the staggering sum of 375 billion dollars a year. So care is not free at all, even though no one pays for it. We pay the price of many deprivations, sometimes even the price of our social contacts and personal health. That is why, in my opinion, it is necessary to change the thinking of society and to increasingly include fathers in care, in what ways - the easiest way is to start teaching adolescents from school that there is no such thing as a woman's job. To teach people mutual respect, consideration, and also at the legislative level, perhaps to arrange things with father's paternity leave. There are probably many things that you and I can think of right now or not, there are really many things that can be done so that this moment of care is shared. Now I am thinking of an incorrect form of the word. It does not have a plural. It exists only in the singular - care.

This is precisely why the CAREdiZO project works towards understanding the value of care and guiding various representatives of society, for example employers or people involved in personnel selection, to understand what representatives of their companies do when they provide care in their home and to appreciate it. Within the project, in the subsequent stages, we will have discussion groups, workshops and trainings, in which we hope that the participants will be able to develop policies that they themselves need, to introduce such policies in their companies, in their organizations and through them to make care more valued. Because in fact, care in the home is care that the whole society brings its positives. They are useful for everyone, not just for the individual.

Do you know what hurts me the most? When I hear a sentence, she doesn't work anything, she is in maternity. Or - she takes care of the grown-up children. Many women have to quit their jobs and stay at home to devote themselves to their families, because we don't recognize that this is work that is paid not to us at the moment in any way, but to the society in which we live, taking care of ourselves. We educate, we guide, motivate, cultivate young people.

You talked earlier about society's attitudes towards care, when it is provided by men or women. For example, people often say, look, this woman didn't wash the windows of her house. How can we change the attitudes in society regarding men's and women's work?

You probably expect me to tell you that it takes several generations, many years, a long period of time for us to mature, to learn, to educate ourselves, to read thick books. I'm not going to say any of the above! Because attitudes change like that. I don't know if our listeners are hearing, I just snapped my fingers. So fast! I joke with my clients that attitudes change when you say it out loud. And then things change. The attitude "men shouldn't take care of raising children, it's women's work" can lead to bad things. Because it has been proven that the exact opposite attitude "men should take care of children" can lead to their well-being. Better physical, health condition, in mental terms they should be confident, established, leaders, preferred, loved, in economic terms they should be able to cope with absolutely everything that comes before them as a challenge. So changing the attitude as quickly as possible, immediately, leads to good results, useful results for the entire society and for us personally.

Let's talk about how the burden of uneven distribution of caregiving at home affects the professional development, the career of caregivers. Often this kills the professional development of women - too many responsibilities at home and her frequent absences from work. Therefore, when a person wants to pay attention to their career, the family suffers. In Bulgaria, we also have to use the help of the elderly people around us, loved ones, acquaintances, so that we do not suffer professionally. No one wants their employee to be absent from work for too long. However, by allowing their subordinates to be absent to take care of the future generation, we also take care of our business. And not to say that there is no workforce, but to educate ourselves through our parents, because you never know - in life it may happen that the compromises we made with our subordinate regarding his family have worked in our favor, because we have a well-bred, educated, young person who returns and continues to work what his father did. We really provide ourselves with a workforce.

Care is a basic European right. It is enshrined in human rights. It should not be measured by how many children you have, what your marital status is, whether you are a single father or a single mother. Everyone who provides care has the desire to feel this care themselves, because, I repeat, this is a basic human right. Wherever we are, at whatever stage of life, in whatever place we are, to receive timely care. It is good to take care of our parents, our mother, our father, our elderly parents, because in this way we unfold, develop our human potential.

We develop within ourselves what we carry from the beginning - kindness.

Let me also continue your thought that when we care, we also win, we win by accumulating empathy skills. Empathy is extremely necessary in modern life, both professional and personal. We also accumulate self-esteem that we have responsibility for something, that we can take responsibility for something. And I am sure that employers, in general, people who care for human resources would appreciate the taking of responsibility, the ability to take responsibility from such people who are caring. Or the fact that they can distribute their time, be able to distribute their tasks because they have become more organized. All of these are valuable qualities, benefits that caregivers have accumulated and that society itself should appreciate.

The direction is very interesting - let's talk, if we haven't talked so far, about the benefits of caring. Apparently they are not financial. All that you said, we can add the useful - we learn to communicate. We learn to be human. And a word that I had not heard for a long time and it is not part of my vocabulary, but only a few days ago I heard in my office "to ground ourselves", "to land ourselves". Caring teaches us humility, and at the same time it teaches us to fight, i.e. reaching a very different humility, not the one that is related to reconciliation, but the one that is related to fighting in a gentle way, with a gentle tone, with etiquette, to stand up. I realize that in caring this fight for others is very easy. A person would have a harder time taking care of themselves, would fight for themselves, but when you fight for the survival of someone else, a small child, a sick child, a sick adult, when you fight for their survival to the point of sacrifice, you really acquire such a fighting spirit in a critical moment to defend yourself. Employers should not be afraid of such a quality that people can defend themselves, because it is never straight-forward, only in the direction of defending myself. It always works as an accumulated quality in many areas. I defend corporate interests, I defend my boss, I defend the organization, I defend... At a time when we are facing many trials, so this fighting spirit and before it, what I said, and the way to communicate more easily with people and empathy, I return to this beautiful word, which we pass to each other a little like a game of tennis, and now the ball is in my court - to be able to put yourself in the other person's place.

Do representatives of society, of business, and if you will, politicians realize that this work, invisible work, invisible labor is so important that it must be taken into account, even when there are some economic losses for the moment.

Is there anything else you would like to add?

We are currently calling it invisible labor, but we were talking a little while ago that the caregiver becomes a very good manager. He skillfully plans his program, his schedule, and manages to combine many things. He certainly does not fall behind in his work, he certainly catches up from home remotely. But now, by specifically calling it invisible labor, we can attach to it everything that concerns labor. Management, marketing, but really everything that concerns invisible labor and labor as a process, we can also refer to care. That is, labor educates, care also. Labor beautifies a person, care also. What is better than caring? This in society turns you into a person from whom we can learn and whom we can admire. Men, women, adults, and even children if you want, when they take care of children, because in school, where I was until lunch today and where I have been for dozens of years, we always talk about how classmates help classmates, take care of classmates. The truth is that what we do makes us more beautiful, in every way.

A wonderful conclusion to our topic about care!

Thanks once again to Valentin Atanasov for including us in this episode of the podcast "Shared Care". Let us say once again that

The podcast was created by the National Business Development Network under the project CAREdiZO - CARE Driven Innovation for Gender mainstreaming in Home, Micro-Enterprises & Micro-CSOs, funded by the European Union within the framework of the "Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values " - CERV programme.

All listeners are welcome back again in the next episode of "Shared Care".

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Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European or the Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor the awarding authority can be held responsible for them.

 

The Shared Care podcast is part of the CAREdiZO campaign for gender equality in caregiving and in the workplace. In the third episode, our guest is Aneta Valeva. Listen to it here https://o pen.spotify.com/episode/0pNnx0oX9XlY8HuD7s521y?si=eSVnx3urQx-e0SI4b2JIPw

 

 

Transcript of episode 3

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Welcome to the new episode of the podcast Shared Care within the CAREdiZO campaign. I am the host Natasha Zarankova.

With us today is Aneta Valeva, psychologist and secretary of the Municipal Commission for Combating Antisocial Behavior in Gotse Delchev. With her we will discuss an extremely important and increasingly relevant topic - parenting through the prism of gender equality.

Nowadays, parenting is a big challenge in itself. It involves many tasks, such as raising children, daily care for them, upbringing, helping with education and many other important commitments. What is being a parent really like and what does it require?

Parenting is perhaps the most important role we have in our lives. To create new life, to preserve it, to build it. And it is a role that builds the basic network of our society and bears fruit in the future according to how parents have raised their children and how they have prepared them for life.

Then they become full-fledged adults who shape the structure of society and how developed, progressive, with rules, with the possibility of a good life and a high quality of life in this society. So an extremely, extremely important role is the role of parents.

Accordingly, do parents need support to be able to take better care of their children?

Well, yes, I would say that they already need such support. Unlike in the past, when somehow parents instinctively understood and followed traditional ways of communicating with children, it was important for the child to survive, to provide food, shelter, clothing, education for the children and for them to be involved in some kind of work. And families were much larger, many generations lived together in a common home, in a common occupation, so children participated in everything that their parents did from a very young age. But nowadays, people's lifestyles have changed a lot.

We live in a time where there is a lot more division between generations. At the same time, parents are faced with completely new challenges, completely new problems that they have to deal with. For example, technology nowadays puts parents under enormous pressure, enormous tension, because on the one hand they are handling much more technology themselves, it puts a strain on their mentality. The work of many parents is also related to processing a huge amount of information, and on the other hand, children are also exposed from a very young age, even before they are born, I would say, immediately after they are born, to a lot of technological exposure, contact with very dangerous information channels for their development, which parents have a responsibility to limit. And in this sense, they face completely new challenges and difficulties in how to establish a full relationship with the child and at the same time maintain the traditional roles in parenting, which are related to care, given that motherhood is limited and the parents themselves also have to work.

Is that what led you to create a parenting skills club? Can you tell us more about it?

Yes, that's one of the reasons I initiated this club.

Currently, it is part of our summer preventive program I Choose Good, which we organize from the Municipal Commission for Combating Antisocial Behavior of Minors and Juveniles. And this year again we had a very large number of children, over 200 children, who participated in this program. I can say that the group of parents who wanted to improve their skills is about 20 people.

And I'm so glad that there is interest in such a club. I would like it to be even bigger and I hope that in the future this club will develop and attract more and more parents. Still, some time is required - 1-2 hours a week to be set aside to attend it.

And sometimes it seems impossible for parents to fit in any more time that they can spare. But the people who are involved are really very aware, and I really enjoy all of our meetings.

And do more mothers or more fathers participate in it?

There are more mothers.

Years ago, I participated in a project called "Growing Up Together" by UNICEF. And we conducted workshops for parents of young children. There, too, such a ratio was observed. The majority were mothers. Men also got involved. And I would say they were one of the most regular visitors to the clubs.

We currently have two dads enrolled. Most are mothers. They are very open, very focused on self-improvement.

People with whom I find it extremely pleasant to communicate, because after all, we are equal there. Although there are presenters, there are participants, but we are absolutely equal. As a parent, I also enjoy communicating with these other parents, who are mostly mothers.

There must be other institutions that provide support to parents, right?

There is also a Center for Public Support in Gotse Delchev. Of course, there are institutions for working with children. There are now more and more psychologists in the schools, pedological counselors. Teachers are very open to partnership, to conversations with parents. Kindergartens are also striving to work more and more with parents. Again, let us remind a person, regardless of whether a woman or a man, should not think too much before turning to specialists for help, to people who could help.

We are gradually moving towards equal parenting. My next question is, do you observe a sharing of child-caring responsibilities between mothers and fathers?

It's different in every case. Sometimes there are also broken families, single parents.

Sometimes there is a division of duties and responsibilities in parenting, in the household. The most common cases are when a woman is expected to take care of both the household and the children, their upbringing. Also, very often these are working mothers, so I still have the feeling that in our society the responsibility for household duties, for raising children is traditionally directed towards the mother.

What are the consequences of mothers being the primary caregivers?

Well, on the one hand, this is very good. This is a basic psychological thread in the role of a woman anyway. So her full communication with the child nourishes her and gives her the opportunity to feel good, complete and to give love and support to the child, which is extremely important.

On the other hand, when it is a working mother and she also has to take care of the maintenance of the entire home, things become a little more busy and I can say that the consequences can sometimes be negative. Such a long-term accumulation of tension, fatigue, and overwork then leads to some problems that women experience. Related to their mental health, their ability to rest, sometimes anxiety disorders and depression occur.

Gradually, when an overload has accumulated over the years, especially when there is no full-fledged communication in the partner couple, when somehow the woman does not feel understood, supported by her partner, then she turns to a psychologist for help, as I have had cases in my practice.

If a woman is overwhelmed with the cares of the family and raising her children, could she be effective in positive parenting?

Well, it's harder in this situation when... as they say, you can't pour from an empty cup.

So, when a person is overloaded, stressed, exhausted, there are fewer options when there is some difficult situation with the child. And it is more difficult for a person to mobilize, I would say, mentally, so as to respond in a more positive way. The parent who is exhausted is much more inclined to immediately name the mistake, to try to punish, to try to ... , with all the strict measures, to stop this behavior that he does not like in the child.

In this sense, the best thing for any child is a calm, controlled, empathetic parent next to him, who connects with him in a more complete way, supporting and at the same time giving frameworks, giving rules, norms, but with a huge resource of encouragement , with a huge resource of love and care for the child. So positive parenting is exactly that. Rather, we need to give ourselves enough care for ourselves, so that we can pour patience from our cup into the child's cup, to set a good example, because children learn mainly by watching us.

That is, parents are largely the ones who educate and shape the way in which children, as future parents, will take on their roles.

And what stops men from participating more equally in home care?

First of all, these are the stereotypes that they have mastered since their childhood. In fact, I would say that even the family memory, even the society, the culture in which this person grows up, has an influence.

We store information from generations back about what was in the relationships between people, generations, generations ago. There is already a lot of scientific research, by the way, in this direction. Not only in terms of these social roles, but also in very deep personal processes.

Accordingly, I think this is the main perception, a model that is so traditional, that is socio-culturally conditioned and one accepts it as the norm. At the same time, when the man also works, he is focused exclusively on his role, which in modern society is to provide financial resources so that the family is financially secure. In the past, the man had to hunt, to provide warmth, take care of some basic living conditions in the home, which are now technologically guaranteed.

But at the same time, the man is expected to provide the financial resources for the family, and this puts men under a lot of psychological pressure. They are extremely focused in this direction. This is also not easy to deal with psychologically, but on the other hand, this focus gives them reason to say, here is the traditional role of the mother, the woman, she should take care of the rest.

And so it's accepted as a rule that this is something. On the other hand, men are also sometimes afraid that they don't know how to do these things, that they won't be good enough at it, like a woman is good at these activities, whether it's cooking or cleaning or taking care of the children. And they're afraid that they won't be good enough at it.

The other thing they are afraid, in my opinion, is that if they make a mistake, if they make a mistake, they will then have to deal with all the negative consequences that these mistakes would bring. But in fact, the desire is much more important than doing something in the best possible way. And precisely assuming that things do not have to be perfect, someone does not have to be without mistakes, without any omissions, what is more important is the desire, the attitude, the readiness and the trust in a family.

In summary, what is your advice to couples and parents on dealing with the challenge that home care actually poses?

As I mentioned earlier, the modern way of life already offers new conditions. And the most natural and logical thing is that between the two sexes in a partnership, between a man and a woman, there should be more equality in terms of both household duties and childcare. And it is precisely in such families where this is built that things are really very harmonious and I think that we should move in this direction.

On the one hand, the woman again has to take care of the home and the children, but at the same time she also has to work. So justice, balance, must be preserved in these partnership relationships.

Finally, I would like to thank our guest Aneta Valeva for revealing to us, as a psychologist, important aspects of combining parenting and home care work.

The podcast was created by the National Business Development Network under the CAREdiZO Project - CAREdiZO- CARE Driven Innovation for Gender mainstreaming in Home, Micro-Enterprises & Micro-CSOs,  funded by the EU under the "Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values" program.

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Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European or the Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor the awarding authority can be held responsible for them.

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The Shared Care podcast is part of the CAREdiZO campaign for gender equality in caregiving and in the workplace. In the second episode, our guest is Rumyana Dzhibova. Listen to it 

https://open.spotify.com/episode/1siUNZcRfLKlEbIQQeWcfC?si=k2Q56JLtRQeQz5GV15jD1w&nd=1&dlsi=cf7c67913fa044d9

 

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Welcome to the new episode of the podcast Shared Care with host Natasha Zarankova.
With us today is Rumyana Dzhibova - secretary of the Izgrev community center, village of Banichan. She is actively involved in preserving and transmitting the rich local cultural heritage to the younger generation, and has developed many initiatives to unite and revitalize the village.
Our conversation is part of the CAREdiZO project, through which we explore how we can create a more equitable sharing of care between men and women. Today we will focus our attention on small settlements to look for the challenges, but also the strength that exists in the community.

Rumi, let's talk about the roles that women take on today. And are there any differences between women who live in small towns and in big cities?

As trivial as it may sound, how can I say, women have always been, perhaps, the leader. They say about this, our predecessors, that the man is the head of the family, but she is the neck. And where the neck bends, the head also turns. So the role of women today is the leader, and I think it is the same today, in today's world. And as for the differences between small towns and the city, of course there is a difference, because a woman from a big city faces the challenges of this city, the distances to work, for example. While in a small town, the child's school is closer, the shops are closer. There is a difference, and everything has its advantages and its negative features.

Generally speaking, what are the commitments of women in a village?

A modern woman in a village, although she continues to bear her responsibilities as a woman, as a mother, as a housewife, at the same time - we are already in the 21st century - this woman works. She is employed. This woman tries, you know, ...  yes, there are women who are ahead with technology, but even in small settlements this woman is already starting to keep up with these modern technologies, so that she can not only communicate with her family, her relatives and friends, who are now all over the world. And she also continues to take care of her livelihood. In the sense that she produces clean food for her family, because she has the opportunities, they have a garden and more time, perhaps, after work, while in cities women have no gardens to go out to sow tomatoes, peppers.

So these are some of the challenges that the modern woman in a small settlement fulfills.

Is there an understanding in the countryside that women should stay home and take care of the home and children, while men go to work? Or are traditional views on the roles of men and women already changing?

There is no way in this actively changing world that the old stereotypes can remain as they were - women should stay home, and men should be the ones outside. Or as they used to say, dad brings, mom makes - children eat. Things have changed in a different way. Every woman is looking for ..., she is a working woman, she is a highly qualified, intelligent woman who is engaged in science, in research. A woman who has already entered medicine, in male professions, which for so many years were considered male. There is no longer a male, female profession and male and female work. Well, we can't say how much of this is from the upbringing of the man and the woman since childhood and what examples they have seen from their parents. And they have transferred this to their family, but it cannot be completely transferred on 100%. Times have changed and things have indeed changed. Women work just as men work.

Very often there are examples when, although sometimes women's work is less appreciated - this is what the statistics indicate ... compared to men's work, but there are cases when women are more highly qualified and they bring more income to the family.

But this does not hinder equality in the distribution of their duties. And the man should respect her work and respect her presence, continue .... to divide their commitments, care for the children according to their understandings, the two of them.

Is there enough support for mothers in villages who want to work? For example, kindergartens and nurseries? Are they accessible? Is there any other type of assistance for raising children in villages?

Unfortunately, the demographic crisis also affects many small settlements. And many of them were left with closed kindergartens. And this forces working mothers to either stay and look after their children, or to take them to the nearest municipal center or settlement where there is a kindergarten.

Another, I would say, is that it is perhaps desirable to make the institutions themselves more flexible in some way. Because a working mother, in order to obtain a document for kindergarten, must either take unpaid leave, not to be absent from work, or sick leave, which parents do a variety of, ... how to call it ..., exercises in order to obtain this, and these documents can somehow be required ex officio. But there is much to be desired in this direction, so that these working parents, working mothers, can be assisted, so that raising children can become easier and more natural. It is also desirable for the state itself to allocate more money for raising children.

In the villages, the connection between generations is much more noticeably preserved. Young families live together with their grandparents, even with their great-grandparents. In this sense, how do the younger ones cope with caring for sick, infirm family members? Is there a distribution of duties and responsibilities for this care? Are men more involved, or do women bear the main part of this work?

Indeed, in the villages, I would say that this connection is still preserved. There are families that live 3-4 generations under one roof, which is good on the one hand. It is good when these elderly people need help and the younger ones help. If the elderly people (definitely) cannot travel to the municipal center, medicines, all other consumables related to their health, a doctor's examination, all this is with the help of the young person.

It's good that there are already programs that provide domestic helpers, assistants, because ... not everywhere they can live with the young and the old. They don't live, for example, if they are in another city or outside the country, where there are these cases, but then there are such assistants or helpers.

In addition to institutions, do people in the villages also rely on help from relatives, friends or neighbors to ease their burden in caring for the sick and elderly?

This help in the villages is the most tangible, the most visible, although there is this institutional help that we talked about. Not everyone, not all the sick and elderly, receives this help, and then they rely entirely on relatives.

A neighbor is bigger than a relative. Everything that happens, the neighbor will know first. Neighbors also help, neighbors also help each other. Whether it will be the woman or men depends on who is on a date.

How is it combined work and family care in a small settlement like Banichan? Are there things that make the balance more difficult than in the city?

This is a question that I would say that .... on the one hand, it is difficult to balance these obligations in the family and at the workplace, but on the other hand, a small village like Banichan, compared to the city, for example, .... but on the other hand, it has its advantages. Then it is easier, it depends on the position, from which angle we look at the issue.

So in the city, for example, it is easier that a person does not travel so much, does not spend time traveling to get to his work (as if travelling from village), to his workplace, and accordingly has more time for family obligations. But on the other hand, in the village of Banichan, people from the community all know each other. Even if you do not have relatives there, you have friends, you have acquaintances on whom you can rely and at a certain moment to relieve your obligations, for example, to have them complete. Whether it's in the morning when you leave for work earlier, or you have to travel to take a trip, they can take your child to kindergarten or school, or pick him up in the evening if your work requires more time to finish.

I understand, there is someone you can count on! By involving people outside the family, you will also cope with these duties more easily. This is really valuable - to be part of a single community, like people in small settlements!
Do you have any ideas about what you think would help women in villages to more easily combine work and care, responsibilities at home?

Ideas can always be born and sometimes they come, as they say, from the difficulties that lie ahead for the young person, for the young woman, for the working person. And many times from what they need, one can suggest what to do, what to improve, there is always such a desire.

As they say, mobile services, even for older people, more flexible working hours can be made for these people or for the institutions that offer such services. In this I want to say what our experience is, the role of the Izgrev community center in this regard. We have offered, so to speak, an academy - Stork Academies, where we have trained children. And even though for one or two hours we separate these children from their mother, from their family environment, not to mention from the phones, at the same time this woman can do her housework and this child can be busy, for example, with us. It's not just these Stork Academies, we've done them, we've offered workshops, where children learn not only the knowledge and skills they acquire, but they also learn about organization, discipline, sharing, etc. There's still much to be desired, institutions can help, and here too the role of the community center in small settlements.

With your initiatives, do you think that you are also helping to educate children and young people towards equality in responsibilities at home?

As I said, from these initiatives that we offer, the various workshops that we offer, the children with us .... there is a folklore group. This is their new family. They feel like a family, they share their holidays, they share ... many times. There is no division there, for example, into women's work or men's work. By getting involved in them, the children have fun, in addition to learning how to do something, they are also being educated in this direction, to be able to share with the person next to you every responsibility and mutual assistance between them, which they think is something that will help them in real life tomorrow. This is the goal of all the activities and topics that the community center is involved in - right, on the young. Building some sustainable models of work.

You have an interesting, how to say, mentoring experience with young couples that you have trained in sharing housework. Will you tell us what you do together?

This is such an interesting question that I could talk about for hours and I am satisfied and ..., how to say, excited by my meetings with these young people.

I am talking about young people between the ages of 20-30 ... couples, young couples who come and I teach them, for example, how to roll a Banichanska svetna banitsa (to cook traditional pastries), they learned about it somewhere on the Internet and ask to come, if I can teach them to make it. I am so happy for them, watching them from the sidelines, but they are young people from different parts of the country and not only, from different parts of the world, I would say, ... that come for such training, .. and these young people are highly qualified personnel. Among them are IT specialists, there are doctors, ... different in their own way.

I would say different in view of the fact that when the boy is more enthusiastic, when I would say he is more leading, the girl is somehow more backward. And in the other couple, I see the girl is the leader. She rushes in, he does everything.  Whatever she say, they were so impresseive.  The other half does everything that the leading half says. But the difference is again, I see, not a difference, but I would say exactly this balance that we talked about at the beginning of the conversation, that an empty space is not tolerated.

The balance between the plus and the minus, that they always attract each other and thus create a pair. And so maybe that's how the world is designed so that they can complement each other. One is always the leader. And not only in making banitsa. But we have done workshops in different places for embroidery. Oh my God, I am so impressed with how men embroider. This is for me, there are no greater specialists than male embroiderers. And even more so, if they are IT specialists. And they see in this, this embroidery, how to say... something of an anti-stress activity. Which they do with such diligence, with such attention, which I am very happy about. And I am hopeful that things will happen. Bulgaria has a future with these young people of ours. If something is lame somewhere, and we older people always say," these children just stand in front of computers, phones. God, how will they live? I don't know what." -  Well, I remember the same way. My grandparents used to say, how will we live? How will we earn a living, being only in front of the TVs? So every time generations are created. And every time, these generations really have to be with the times, because that is what time is. We cannot stop the development of communities, of time, of generations. But despite everything, I am glad that they are finding their roots. They are looking for them, they are finding them and they are continuing. Because a tree without roots cannot grow. And despite everything, the Bulgarian root will not be lost.

It is very good that these institutions, such as Chitalishte Izgrev, are looking for new ways to bring people together, even in relation to care, in the home, in the family, by using, as you say, the root culture, the wealth that we have inherited from the past.
In this regard, what advice would you give to young families about care in the family and how to share them?

Well, the advice that I would give them from the distance of time, of my life, of the meetings that I have with different generations, is that all responsibilities should be distributed equally.

Caring for the person next to you, it should perhaps be a primary concern before caring for oneself. We should not create or raise selfish people, but we should raise people who live in love, in understanding, in their family, first of all children and parents, with their neighbor,... to have love between them is understanding, from there on between spouses. And this is understanding.

Understanding is the thing that always leads to success, to prosperity. And if a being, whether it will be the wife or the husband, after they have decided to live together, should really share both the joys and the worries together, it is easier to get through it, because they say shared joy is double the joy, and shared sorrow is half the sorrow. Let there be more shared joys!

Thank you very much Rumi for this conversation, for the wisdom and experience that you shared with us. I hope they reach many people and find in them a path to balance and equality.

Welcome back to the next episode of Shared Care

The podcast was created by the National Business Development Network under the CAREdiZO Project -C AREdiZO- CARE Driven Innovation for Gender mainstreaming in Home, Micro-Enterprises & Micro-CSOs, , funded by the EU under the "Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values" program.

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Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European or the Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor the awarding authority can be held responsible for them.

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CAREdiZO is launching a campaign for gender equality in caregiving and the workplace. As part of this, we start a podcast on the topic. Listen to the first episode of "Shared Care" here https://open.spotify.com/episode/2N1Lgmq9QHFYtT9rhQTCCX?si=YVquCT4TTDmFTcb56_FyuQ&nd=1&dlsi=a134b0496f8b4ee0  and here тук https://youtu.be/vFqMo0M1Yvk :

 

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Episode 1 Transcript:

Hello and welcome to the first episode of the podcast “Shared Care”.
I am Natasha Zarankova and I will be your host on this journey towards a fairer distribution of care between women and men.
This podcast is for everyone interested in equality, work-life balance, and the power of small organizations to change society.

Main topic: The distribution of “care” and why it matters. In “Shared Care” we focus on caregiving responsibilities – in the home, in the family, in everyday life. This includes raising children, caring for elderly parents, sick loved ones, housework – often invisible but extremely important. Our goal is to show that this care should be shared – between genders, between generations, between institutions. “Shared Care” is our contribution to the professional and economic empowerment of women and equality in the workplace.

In this episode of the podcast “Shared Care”, I will introduce you to the CAREdiZO initiative.
The National Business Development Network has started work on the CAREdiZO Project -  CARE Driven Innovation for Gender mainstreaming in Home, Micro-Enterprises & Micro-CSOs, funded by the EU under the “Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values” Programme.

CAREdiZO aims to eliminate gender gaps in caregiving. This is done by promoting approaches that transform the traditional roles of men and women in homes, micro-enterprises, micro-civil society organizations, while at the same time implementing innovative digital tools, wider inclusion and sharing of models.
The main objectives of the project include:
- Promoting family-friendly practices in micro-enterprises and micro-civil society organizations by strengthening the capacity of their leaders.

- Challenging gender stereotypes in order to promote equal sharing of informal care for children, the elderly, household work, etc.

- Raising awareness of the value of care and the importance of the skills needed for this type of work

- Motivating and engaging micro-enterprises and civil society organizations to support equity in care

- Creating a network for cooperation and exchange of good practices

Within the Caredizo project :
1.we will carry out research, build a supportive community and online labs in which, together with representatives of target groups and politicians, we will discuss good practices and new policies for gender equality in care.
2. We will develop a serious game, an e-course and targeted trainings for trainers, as well as for people who manage or are human resources specialists in micro-enterprises and micro-civil society organizations.
3. We will engage the attention of a wide range of people – employers, politicians, community representatives, civil society organizations working in support of women, and small businesses through a Targeted campaign to raise awareness of the value of care work at home and promote equal sharing
4. We plan to hold local and international events to share results

In Caredizo, together with the National Business Development Network from Bulgaria, are partnering organizations from Greece, Lithuania and Cyprus. This consortium of organizations operating in various areas of the civil sector – women's empowerment, gender equality policies, family support, support for small businesses, includes specialists and experts with extensive experience and attitude to the problems and needs that the project is engaged with. We all believe that with joint efforts we can achieve the common goal - shared care, responsibilities, opportunities!

What we expect to achieve in Caredizo:
▪ We want micro-enterprises and civil society organizations to be more aware of the needs, challenges and consequences of implementing gender equality and family-oriented practices.
▪ We expect, through the tools created together with stakeholders, the collected good practices and trainings, to support the integration of gender equality in micro-enterprises and micro-CSOs, regarding care.
We will build a close relationship with the target groups by creating a digital community of practitioners.
▪ We hope to change the stereotypes and neglect of care work that exist in our society
We want the project to encourage more men to get involved in care and sharing household work, as well as to prevent any forms of unfavorable treatment and discrimination of women and men who have taken family care leave.
The Caredizo project is funded by the EU's  CERV - Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values Programme.

Thank you for joining us for the first episode of the "Shared Care" podcast
Stay tuned for more information, interviews, and discussions on the topic soon.

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Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.