The Best Place in the World to Raise Kids

“Mark Zuckerberg: 699 Million People Use Facebook Today And Soon We’ll Connect The Whole World”—as reported in www.businessinsider.com (Sept. 11, 2013)

Most of the people I am connected to on Facebook are friends, family members, or acquaintances that I would be connected to whether or not this social medium existed. That being said, there are a handful of precious fallen friendships that are being rekindled. You know the kind, right? I’m talking about those whose ties should never have been broken, yet they somehow became detached in the shuffle we call life.

I lost touch with such a friend two decades ago. Hmmm…, that makes me sound old, doesn’t it?

After finishing high school in Montreal, Quebec, this particular friend moved to Ottawa (Canada’s capital) to continue her studies. With her university degree in hand, she hopped across the ocean and landed her first “real” job working for a bank in London, England.

While overseas, she met, married, and started a family with an American fellow co-worker. Since meeting her husband, this friend has lived in more countries than I can count on both hands due to job transfers.

Living this gypsy lifestyle may sound glamorous, but my friend insists it is pretty trying at times. And I believe her. Packing the family up for a two-week vacation is exhausting. I can’t imagine what it would be like to pack up house and home over and over to the extent that she does it.

So, to bring a sense of normalcy to their insane (her word, not mine) gypsy lifestyle, my friend travels each summer with kiddies in tow to her husband’s hometown. Incidentally, his hometown happens to be on a little island off the coast of Massachusetts. Can you say Martha’s Vineyard? Am I sounding jealous? Maybe just a titch.

After learning what my long-lost friend had been up to for the past 20-some-odd years, I had to ask… Of all the places she’s lived over the years, which one would be the best suited for raising children?

Here is what this amazing mother of three (daughter, 8.5; son, 6.5; son, 15m) had to say:

Gosh, one place… Love Canada’s culture, miss the people so much but not the weather or the taxes.
Love the US for access to food/products, love the island, but dislike the politics and struggling economy.
Love Switzerland for mountains, access to things, but people there are too privileged making them all a bit spoiled.
Denmark has a great quality of life but people seem miserable and unfriendly, very high takes (60% [income tax]).
London is not good for kids, very hard to get around, life quality is less but the city has fun people and good access to food/products.
If it were just my husband and I, we would probably move to the Italian or French Riviera…
But, with the kiddies, I think where we are living is great [Copenhagen, Denmark].
That being said, I would live in Switzerland if we had the money to send them all to private schools and were able to afford a nice lifestyle there.

They say that Facebook is where people talk fake to their friends. And, for the most part, I’d say this theory holds true. But, once in a while, a golden nugget surfaces via this social medium.

Thanks for the memories T, and for sharing your thoughts on where in the world you believe is the best place to raise kids.

Anita

Photo courtesy of Flickr:

Photo courtesy of Flickr: