(Nelly, Community Counselor, and her powerful au pairs in New Jersey.)

Happy International Women’s Day

To celebrate, GA would like to spotlight on taking the power.

The World Health Organization estimates that 1 in every 3 women in the world experience violence and these stats have not improved over the past decade. Women living overseas are an especially vulnerable population, in that they are learners of a new language, surrounded by different values and behaviors. Those who have lived overseas know day-to-day interactions can feel foreign and understanding threats can get lost in cultural misinterpretations.  Step in the APIA community counselors who set up women’s self defense and martial arts classes.

In women’s self-defense courses, what transpires in the “mechanics” of an unequal struggle is slowed down, describing how women can use the space between and their own bodies as leverage if it is not their own physical strength that will serve in the moment.  Body positioning for finding the best balance and defensive tactics might include:

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Elena, a CC in CT states that their “self-defense class at a karate studio was a huge HIT (no pun intended 😉) for 20 au pairs. Au pairs enjoyed the instruction and the jokes of the Master and learned how to defend themselves (and a bit about their own strengths and weaknesses.)”

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Below au pairs from New Jersey are seen in APIA CC, Katja’s, Gracie Barra self defense class.
Katja shares that this group was hungry post work out and headed to a Chinese restaurant next door after this shot.

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Christine, Lisa and Maria, CCs in Washington, DC hosted a Women’s Self Defense class earlier this year. Totally exhausted by the end, au pairs learned so much valuable information. Maria states, “The class honestly gave us the confidence to know that we CAN protect ourselves should the need ever arise.  One of the trainers was a DC policeman, another retired from the Special Forces and they shared some crazy tactics. They taught us how to take a bra, sling it around the back of an intruder’s neck and pull the elastic band towards ourself, cutting off blood flow to the carotid artery on their neck without them even realizing that they would faint.”
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In WA, the local police station taught 30 au pairs from 12 different countries.  The women practiced how to guard against an assailant, lessons they can take with them to their own home countries and use throughout life.