IMAGINE your father losing his job and having trouble finding another one in these challenging economic times. There is one employable female in your family and she is the only chance your family has to live decently.
Not having finished a higher education and with the limited options in the local job market, she opts to work overseas in a country with a more progressive economy.
Off she goes and her monthly remittances start coming in. It is not a lot but you are able to scrape by each month. Your family is now able to eat three meals a day, your siblings can go to school and you can pay for transportation and electricity bills.
She misses home terribly but she cannot call often as her employer has taken away her mobile phone. She finds a way and sneaks around for that precious, quick phone call just so she can hear the voices of loved ones on the other end and ease her loneliness.
Far, far away: It can be tough working in a foreign land far from home and family. She works seven days a week, from dawn to late at night and is rarely given any days off.
Often, she is paid less than what is stated in her contract but she takes it, as it is all she has got. Her employer even limits her social contact and she cannot go to the supermarket to buy her own toiletries. She asks the kindness of her neighbours to buy stuff for her in secret.
Imagine if this is what your mother, your daughter or your sister had to go through. And now, look at your maid!
Our idyllic late weekend breakfast was shattered one sunny day when we heard the distraught screaming of a woman a few houses away from ours. A Madam had sent her Cambodian maid out of her house sans belongings.
“Give me my money and my passport! I want to go home!” the maid screamed in surprisingly good English, as most Cambodians I’ve encountered hardly speak the language.
A few of us concerned neighbours approached her and asked why she was screaming and what was wrong!
Her Madam came out and started explaining what had happened. Without going into the details of the discussion, there are always two sides to any story. Both parties have equal rights to terminate the employment contract when either one is neither happy nor satisfied or a good working relationship seems impossible.
This does not justify, however, any employer withholding their maids’ passports. It gets worse when the passport in question apparently expired three weeks prior to the exchange, and the employer cannot produce it because “it is still being renewed” in the time frame way beyond its validity.
Earlier that same day, a Filipina maid from across the street fled from her employer in tears. The only word she could apparently manage in between sobs was that “she couldn’t take it anymore.”
No mother, daughter or sister would willingly or gladly leave her family to go and work overseas. But she does it so her family will survive and she is often their only hope.
When we arrived in Kuala Lumpur a few months back, we received an Expat Welcome Pack complete with some useful guides for expatriates. It is packed with tips on how to set up your new life in a new country.
It also offers information on how to go about hiring domestic help. It is common knowledge that Filipina maids are paid higher than their Indonesian and Cambodian counterparts. In general, Indonesians and Cambodians are not given any days off and not allowed to retain cash in their belongings. Some Filipinas are subjected to these same conditions as well.
It has been in the news recently that all three governments of these nationalities have recently either halted or decreased their export of domestic workers due to allegations and reports of abuse and other forms of inhumane treatment.
Those who can afford household help are aware how maids ease up a lot of our load on the domestic front, whether it is minding the children, cleaning the house or doing the laundry and ironing clothes. If she can cook, then you’ve hit the jackpot.
I can truly appreciate having the help at home after living in The Netherlands for the past five years. My husband and I juggled everything from raising a baby and a toddler, working at our individual jobs and running a business. Hiring full-time help was out of the question financially.
Like any employer-employee relationship, domestic helpers are not perfect and sometimes do not perform their duties in the manner we expect things to be done. It is useful to remember when patience is wearing thin that they are not white-collar workers.
Had they been given the same opportunities most of us educated and highly-skilled individuals were given under the circumstances, they would not have chosen to become maids. But they do because it is often the only option they have.
It is a common belief that what we give out to the universe, we receive in return. Kindness begets kindness!
Treat a worker right and you will be rewarded with faithfulness and loyalty.
A little patience, a little compassion and a little understanding of their backgrounds and where they are coming from can help us manage our expectations.
They have feelings, they laugh, they cry,they get tired and they need rest. They miss the sons and daughters they left behind so they can clean your toilets and prepare your meals. Some are good and some are bad. Some are capable of taking advantage of us. But most of them come with good hearts and will love your children as if they were their own.
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