Month: January 2011

Being a girl is pretty awesome, and I’m sure a lot of my fellow ladies will agree with me for the most of it, but there comes a time every now and then, when I’m sure most of us wished we were guys. No, I’m not talking about the hot summer days when most of us wished we could play shirtless soccer without drawing any attention to ourselves, or the time we wished we could take trips without our parents worrying about us 24/7. It’s more like that time when every single girl is totally justified in voicing every complaint and is more than justified in being pissed off, even for the slightest things. Here in North America, no one really understand the extent to which we are blessed. In many developing nations such as Africa, young girls aren’t as lucky as us, even when it comes to the most basic of necessities. In East Africa, educators have reported a high absenteeism rate from school among young women during their menstruation cycle due to a lack of resources for sanitary protection combined with a lack of knowledge about this feminine issue. Seeing this, Proctor and Gable, along with ‘the Girl Child Network’ initiated the “Always stay in school” campaign. A commitment has been made by P&G to provide 15,000 girls with enough sanitary protection to last two years, and to provide $200,000 and $4 million women hygiene products to protect and educate young women.

Not only has P&G understood the dynamics behind making large profit margins, but they have also understood the social responsibility they have towards their consumers. In the pricing of these products they have taken into consideration the economic constraints of African consumers and have priced their products accordingly. This initiative supports two of the UN Millennium  development goals and is a great example of global partnering to enhance the lives of vulnerable women through education, empowerment and provision of resources.

36, 25, 36- perfect body? More like impossible body for most of us. Everyone now a days seems to be absolutely obsessed with losing weight, and gaining that super model, skinny figure that you almost only see in magazines. Unless of course, you are one of those lucky few who were given the ultimate gift of a high metabolism rate like my older sister. Many people seem to be dissatisfied with their figures, and have some how managed to have mistaken ‘thin’ for ‘fit’. This is definitely not the case and one can imagine the joy I experienced when i came across the Nike womens campaign. Thunder thighs, Big Butt, Man shoulders. Ideal? maybe not. But who is to say it is not beautiful?

Nike’s campaign focuses on the “real” woman by celebrating women who don’t have the socially ideal body, but are nonetheless, proud and confident of what they can achieve. It pushes away rail thin models and fits right in to the reality trend in our daily lives. This campaign pitches its products to women who want to look better, but in a more realistic way. It simultaneously makes women advocates of their own body as well as the Nike brand by making women feel like they are in control of their lifestyle. When women see this, most of them relate to what is being said and feel a sense encouragement and a boost of self esteem, which is exactly what Nike aimed to do, to attract women to buy their products. Nike penetrated a new market by focusing on women, unlike other sporting brands that are mostly geared to men.

I am an avid squash player, and I gave up on the skinny figure my sister has after i realized 30 hours of training a week did not make me lose the pounds I thought Mcdonalds had given me.

Just LOVE it!