Ana Oprescu on Travelling as a Mom

I wrote this short piece about travelling with my baby. My point with this, is to bring attention to a compromise parents might not have to make anymore.

Work traveling with Maria.

In my home country, mothers can spend up to two years of almost fully paid maternal leave. The Netherlands, with their 16 weeks is a far cry. Luckily, my husband, a freelancing mathematician, can travel with me and take care of Maria while I am participating in the various work activities. As such, Maria has already joined the Nijmegen SusTrainable Teacher Training before she had turned 1, and then joined ICT4S and the SusTrainable summer school. It has not been easy, and the EU does not help in any way, but the UvA is a great employer in this sense, and I can focus much better while traveling for work, knowing I will join Maria in the late afternoon, as if a normal day at ‘home’.