"Think before you share"

Help, I am without my passport, no phone and the camera is gone! No, I have not been robbed just searched at the entrance of the Embassy. It seems like a feat I got passed the first gendarme outside the building who did not seem to speak proper English nor French. In many other countries I would not dare to leave my passport with the personnel at the entrance and right now I feel like I'm the suspect rather than a simple visitor. However, these are the rules and the security staff do not look like they are to be messed with.

This leaves me without my i-phone to take notes and I cannot take pictures either. It hits me how essential these two items are for fast and effective blogging. I am lost without my devices!

So, here I am sitting in the cafeteria (taking notes) invited by a friend to participate at the Embassy's "Brown Bag Lunch on Social Media" where an expert was to give us an overview of social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat. Not quite sure what to expect, it turned out I was probably NOT her target audience due to my relatively tight grasp on social medias. She shared her industry knowledge on various topics including: functionality, usage, privacy, and safety for parents with children using social media.

It seems that social media is the buzz word of the moment, at least this end of the pond, even the kids' school had an info session on social media safety this week. Again, it was not very enlightening. Then again, how DO you teach your kids about these communication behaviors? How do you encourage them to use the internet as a tool and how CAN you protect them from the bad things lurking out there?