Household work is often at best under-appreciated and at worst conveyed condescendingly - (dirty) laundry, (greasy) dishes, or (stinky) baby bottoms. Truth be told - dictionary.com defines "chore" as "a hard or unpleasant task."

Thankfully, the OECD's 3 March report, Cooking, Caring and Volunteering: Unpaid Work around the World suggests that without voluntary or unpaid work, the world we're living in would be at best a third or at worst even half worse off.

Suddenly, household chore doesn't sound so dirty anymore.

The report also evidences how the burden of unpaid work falls disproportionately on women across the 29 countries studied. With just two exceptions, unemployed fathers spend invariably less time taking care of their children than working mothers. And while the South Korean man spends just 50 minutes on unpaid household work, the Indian woman dedicates up to 5 hours a day more than her man to the tasks at hand (yes pun intended).

Today, 8 March, is international women's day. I think the last time I mentioned this in Singapore was years ago, purely because nobody is ever aware of it here. And so I was pleasantly surprised that my co-worker was telling me all about it this morning. But well, she spent a semester in Vietnam, where the day is probably more celebrated than Valentine's. But when my Bulgarian ex-boss mentioned 8 March later during lunch (maybe it's a communist thing?), I was genuinely delighted! So I need to end my year-long hiatus and write something about it.

Gifts are like presents - just better. I think the best gift to all the ladies in the world is our overdue appreciation that they matter just as much as men. And the best form of appreciation is to walk the talk. So enjoy it if you live in Australia, where men spend more time caring for their children than anywhere else in the world, or in Denmark, where your men will diligently do 3 hours of housework for you every day.

Hey, happy women's day :) Most of all to those in Asia!