Olga Mecking
Your Business English Friday Podcast
 
Olga Mecking is a linguist, cook, blogger and mum. Living in the Hague, Holland, she shares her experiences and recipes in regular posts about expat motherhood. She shared some of these experiences on this week’s Friday podcast as well, and told us what it was that prompted her to start blogging about her life as a expat mum.
Adversity often has a silver lining, or forces us into positive actions that we would not otherwise take. So it was for Olga Mecking who started her blog about life as an expat Mum following a very traumatic incident with her first child. Spotted restraining her daughter, who was having a fit, Olga was confronted by the police and accused of child abuse. The experience left her feeling so alone and misunderstood that she felt she needed to express herself and her experiences somewhere. So it was that www.europeanmama.com was born.
Olga has been blogging since 2011 about a variety of subjects including the travels she has made around Europe, language learning, and cooking. She also talks about the business of raising children to be tri-lingual. Something she has experience of from both ends; having been raised multi-lingual herself, as well as teaching her children.
In fact Olga can speak 5 languages in total. Much of this comes from her upbringing in Poland, where her father spoke French, her mother was practically native English and German was taught to her at school. She now has added Dutch to the list, which she says is relatively easy to learn for a German speaker.
Such a pro herself, Olga has plenty of tips for language learners. Most of all she recommends reading a lot in the language you are trying to learn. Reading aloud and reading on a Kindle (so that you can easily check words you need to know – in just one touch!). This improves your vocabulary and writing skills. When it comes to speaking, she cautions against perfectionism. Never prepare the perfect sentence in your head, just speak, make mistakes and welcome corrections from your listeners.
It’s also interesting to hear Olga’s take on the differences in healthcare between the two places she has lived most of her adult life: Germany and Holland. She reports that the approaches are quite different, especially in the provision of care to pregnant women and new mothers. On the one hand it appears that it’s much harder to get specialist treatment in Holland and to get prescribed medication. Natural home births are encouraged for instance. On the other, there is a fantastic post-natal service where a midwife/nurse comes over to your house and does all the domestic chores, 5 hours a day, for your first eight days of motherhood. What a system.
Thanks for all the stories Olga. For many more stories and reports from the front line of Dutch-style motherhood, check out Olga’s blog: http://www.europeanmama.com/















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