Maid

Last week an interesting article on maid abuse surfaced in the papers. This article was of course spawned by the week before’s 15th floor maid incident. NSTP interviewed some abused maids who are currently seeking shelter at the Indonesian Embassy. There were many horrifying stories. But what is more appalling is that one abused maid’s employer was let go after paying a fine. Only fined ?

What a load of crap. Abuse is abuse no matter to whom it was done to. The last time I checked, Malaysia is not an apartheid country. Foreign workers although do not have full rights as we Malaysian do ( like voting or free education or whatever ), still have the right to be safe and to be paid for the services they have provided, among other things. They still deserved to be respected, to be pitied and most importantly to be treated as human. Basic human rights that is given to all people no matter if there are on their own soil or not.

I condemn the authority that let abusive employer’s go with a mere fine. Just a stupid slap at the wrist. These things can put a permanent label to us. I mean we Malaysians endure labelling our whole lives. You know, every Malay is lazy, or this race are liars and people of that ethnic group are thieves. I mean come on, we do not even have to look at other races, we Malays even dissect our own people by the state they come from. How Kelantanese is like this and Kedahan is like that etc. Do we want to be known as a country of abusers ? It will stick to you, you know. Especially when stories of fined abuser leak out to the whole world. It shows that abusing maids are the norm of our countrymen. “ Oh everybody does that here. Just yesterday, I poured hot oil over my maids body because she didn’t wish me good morning !! “ The acts of a minority can effect the whole nation.

Having a live-in maid is part of our culture. When I was small, all our maids came from Johor. I don’t know why but they just did. One stayed for 6 years until she got married and after that we had a succession of Johorian maids with 1 to 2 years stint each. We usually lose them to their boyfriends and after that we got ours from Indonesia.

So when I moved to my own abode 4 years ago, there was no question of whether I am getting a maid or not.

Our maid was good to us initially. The house was clean but most importantly my children were happy. We have two tellies and which ever one we used, she would use the spare one. I once cooked alone because she wanted to watch a Hindustan movie upstairs. I let her be as to me there is no issue there. She was at home the whole day and as far as I am concerned, if I get to go home and relax, she can too. Her condition is worst than mine as I can leave my office. She can’t. She sleeps and breathes her workplace.

Everyday I will leave her some money just in case she wants to do a little bit of shopping at the nearest shop or too lazy to cook. When I found out that she liked to read, I bought her new Malay novels every month. Sometimes I even furnished her with Malay magazines ! All in the name of compassion and pity.

When we went out, the kids didn’t want her to assist them at all. Dan and I still had to feed and mind them. She is left with carrying our things. I didn’t like that. My mom didn’t like that either. I remember us taking the maid out only once because mummy didn’t like Kakak trying to make herself useful by carrying whoever is youngest at that time or our things and then walked 2 – 3 paces behind us like she didn’t deserve to be with us. Therefore Dan and I always asked if she wanted to come along. She usually didn't. So we stopped asking knowing that if she wanted to come, she could just say so. She was relieved because she said she preferred to stay home to relax and watch the telly anyway. Why not ?

Whenever we were home, the kids were our responsibility. She never bathed or fed them whenever we are around. They are our kids and therefore our duty. I do not have the stomach to let somebody else be with my kids, nurturing and loving them whenever I am around. Therefore whenever we were home, the kids were completely ours.

So you could imagine her life. We respected her, we called her Kakak and she just called us by our names. I learnt to buy Malay DVDs to keep her entertained and watched them with her so that she had somebody to watch them with. I bought her RM 100 shoes, real leather ones because none at Bata fits. I bought her a set of pots, the ones that she had been dreaming of. I even paid for her intelligent son’s monthly school fees and promised that I would give her the money to buy her own cooking gas tank.

Then I found out that she had been abusing my kids. Not just physically but she had been yelling and cursing them too. She even spread lies about us to our neighbours, lies so outlandish that luckily none wanted to believe. Our neighbours saved us by ratting on her. Apart from that, before we found out that she was doing those things, she was offensive to us. About 5 months after she entered our homes, she started to be cynical and rude but since we needed her service and didn’t want her to hurt our precious ones ( which she did anyway ), we just closed one eye.

What did I do ? I did nothing. I sent her to my in-laws’ house without so much as a harsh word and soon after that showed them her true colours to them and were sent back to Indonesia, pronto.

Did I want to kick her sorry arse ? Yup. Did I want to slap her face ? Badly. Did I want to rant and rave until I get hoarse ? Until now the feeling is there. But I didn’t want to because I still have empathy. But most importantly because I am a Muslim, I got more class than that. I would not stoop that low.

Errmm… I think my entry today veered from my original plan. I got sidetracked because of course this issue reminded me of HER. So… well.. I have lost my original train of thoughts. I basically wanted to voice my displeasure of all these monsters who abused their maids because my maid abused my family mentally and physically and I didn't lay a finger on her.

Maybe I will get them back… My thoughts that is...