After nearly 3 years of living in our first home, my husband suggested that we should employ a Domestic Helper better known as an Amah in our region. The move was not as sudden as it seems as we did contemplate of having a complete stranger living with us where she will be doing our house chores, laundry, preparing our meals and occasionally keep an eye on Guinevere who was then just 4months shy of her 3rd birthday.

Suminah, or better known as Minah, arrived at our home in March. Minah had previously worked in Singapore for 4 years and in Dubai for 1.5 years (the reason she did not finish her 2 year contract in Dubai was because she claimed that her them employer did not provide “adequate” amount of food for their domestic helpers – I believed her then) Her experience in Singapore was a different one altogether. She worked for a family who had 2 disabled family members and her tasks was to cook, clean and look after them but she commutes everyday instead to her employer’s place. So her working experience might be like a regular resume you would read so we didn’t thought of how she would be working with us.

Now my husband has a tendency to be suspicious of Amahs (thanks to his mothers’ former Amah who ended up marrying their neighbor and went on to became a “Tai-Tai”) but I on the other hand, preferred to see them as how I would like my own boss to treat/see me -> as an equal employee in any corporation/company. So I went on to brief her on her duties and our expectations of her. Her duties were basically to keep the house spotlessly clean and to cook occasional meals mostly dinner. She does not need to look after our daughter as we will continue to send her to her nannys’ place. When Minah has completed her chores, we allowed her some rest time and she was most welcome to spend her free time tending to our garden. We had also allowed her a certain degree of communication with our neighbors’ maids who coincidentally are from Indonesia as well. For accommodation, she has her own quarters at the back of our house which has a small kitchen area and a bathroom. The only thing that is not allowed of her would be owning a mobile (she is being allowed to call home via a phone card which is deducted from her salary) and having any day offs. This has also been stipulated in her contract and she was being briefed again on this by the Agent before she came to us. As employers, we had provided her with basic necessities such as bath gel, shampoo (she even requested for her preferred brand and we obliged) personal care items, biscuits, coffee and other occasional treats. I had even took her out shopping for undergarments, clothes and 2 new pair of shoes as the ones she came with did not look comfortable and it was mangy looking. Some employers would deduct these expenses off  their Amah’s salary but we did not partly because we wanted her to feel comfortable and appreciated and in return she would perform her duties with utmost care and responsibility while taking note of her overall conduct at all times.

The first few months breezed through and over time, we got accustomed to having an Amah living with us. Chores were the least of our worries and we spent more time doing other things and going to places we had previously talked about.  There was even twice when we had left Minah at home all alone but only for one night when we checked in to Empire Hotel for a weekend getaway. Little did we know of her “activities” that she has been actively conducting behind our backs!

We had our suspicions and even my husbands’ mother who had spent a short time staying with us had voiced out her ‘concerns’ over Minahs’ sudden disappearing acts. The truth finally revealed itself when our neighbor; who is constantly busy with her 3 sons, texted me out of the blue one night asking me out for breakfast the next morning. Of course I welcomed it thinking that maybe finally she has time to spend some time with me instead of just talking over the fence. At that time, we had just bought a 2 way return ticket to Surabaya for Minah as she is agreeable to continue on working for us. Her ticket costed us around $530. The day before, we had bought her a wheeled luggage bag thinking it would be easier for her bring her belongings back to Indonesia as the luggage bag she had came with was rather small and she had to hand carry the heavy bag once filled. That bag costed us $40.

Our neighbor, Grace, was very punctual for our breakfast meeting and I swear she had an urgent look on her face when she walked through the restaurant door. She promptly sat down, ordered and asked me if we were planning to renew Minahs’ contract in which I happily replied “Yes!” and then she proceeded to tell me in what seemed like the most disgusting and inhumane thing anyone would ever want to do.

Minah, apparently has been offering her services to a few men who has been visiting our home when we were out at work and to top it off, she found herself being 2.5months pregnant is trying to conduct a self abortion in our home. The father of the child was the guy who comes to collect our rubbish collection payments and this activity has been going on for almost 1 year behind our backs! After her “boyfriend” left her, she had turned on her charms to seduce our grass cutter who, apparently, rejected her advances.  So how does Grace came to know about this? Turns out that her part-time maid was the one who had told her and our Minah was asking her to help her get some Indonesian concoctions for abortion. Apparently Minah had consumed the medications about 3-4 times and it looked like the abortion was not going to happen. This had prompted us to call the Agent and have them arrive at our home the following day to take Minah away….without her knowledge.

So the next day the Agent came and that morning itself, Minah packed her bags and left in which she was to be sent home on a one way ticket. When I had confronted her, she could still put on a show and defended her innocence until I brought out a pregnancy test kit and told her that we will be validating her denial there and then. That was when the tears started streaming down her face and the look of a cat being caught with a fish was plastered all over her face. I was told by my friend once that when we send our Amahs home, it would be ideal to see them pack their bags in case they had packed away any of our belongings to take home with them. That day, I discovered Minah had bought herself a mobile phone – a Nokia E Series business phone and she was getting a lot of calls as she packed which I am guessing is from the other maids in the neighborhood wanting to know the reason behind her sudden departure. Had she dared answered the phone in my presence, I would have really gave it to her. The fact that we had trusted her to look after our home, taken care of her and in return she had violated our trust by bringing in strangers, men, into our home is unforgivable! And to imagine if we had entrusted her to look after our child, heaven knows what might have happened while she is “servicing” her clients! I dread to think that our daughter could even be a possible victim or a “dessert” for her clients!

Minah's calling card

That weekend we had our long time trusted part-time cleaner came by to help us “sanctify” Minah’s quarters and also to do a thorough cleaning for our home as the following days after Minah left, we started to “discover” some short cuts which she has been doing with her job. It’s like having a half past six Amah and we would be better off doing the chores in the first place instead of hiring her. So the spring cleaning project began and we found even more astonishing items in Minahs’ room which she could not pack in time. We found a photo album of her together with another maid from the neighborhood in their Sunday best in various America’s Next Top Model poses and we are suspecting that the photos served as a calling card as well because at the back of one photo it has Minahs’ hand writing with the words “Darling, I Love You! My name is Aminah”. So her “working name” is “Aminah” and while she continues her charade with us, she remains as Suminah. I’m starting to wonder if Suminah is even her real name to begin with. We also found a couple of my recipe books, my hair bands that I thought I had misplaced, my daughter’s hair clips and to top it off, a little blue book that contains several local contact numbers with names of various men and other maids in the neighborhood – we are suspecting the last part. We also got to know from our neighbor that Minah had went out “shopping” in the night after she had finished her chores. We normally dismiss her around 8pm-ish and that is when we can hear her chatting away with the other maids across the fence.

This whole incident has thought us to be more vigilant, assertive and strict if we should ever find the need to hire another full time domestic helper in future. Perhaps our fault lies in not installing CCTVs around the perimeter of our house. If that was done initially, then we would be able to monitor her even when we are at work and we wouldn’t have men coming over to our home at hours when we are all at work. Perhaps we should have been like the other employers  instead of being so kind and accommodating to her. We treated her with nothing but kindness and respect and she didn’t even had to look after our daughter which I know of most families will without thinking twice have their Amahs look after their children, babies, elderly family members and a litter of kittens. Perhaps Minah should work with a family of such the next round and maybe by then she would finally realized how fortunate she was when she was under our employment.

Mother's Love by Kolongi

My mother told me 4 valuable advice that has eventually embedded in my head and heart and ultimately saw me went on to successfully breastfeed my daughter until almost the age of 4.

This is what she said to me :

1) Offer the breast every time your baby is upset, even if you had just fed her.

2) Co-sleep with your baby. It’s much more easier than having to be wide awake and walk over to her crib.

3) Always have a bottle of water or snacks nearby to keep you hydrated and hunger pangs at bay especially when cooking a meal will be challenging when baby comes home.

4) Focus on feeding your child and not on the volumetric amounts that she is/will be taking in. Breastfeeding is not like bottle feeding. Our breasts do not come with volumetric measurements.

It was rather difficult to comprehend and follow at the initial stage. I remember crying and getting angry at my daughter simply because she was crying and fussing. As a first time mother, I am sure we had all walked this way down sometime or other and being alone most of the was not much of a help either. My husband, Vincente, was traveling back and forth between Kota Kinabalu and Brunei for work at that time as part of his new appointment and I only had him home with us on a maximum of 10-15 days tops in a month. As a new mother, I found that to be very taxing, both emotionally and physically. Trying to do the housework and wanting to sit down to have a decent meal seems like an impossible tasks all together.

My mother was a couple of thousand miles away and my mother-in-law had no experience in breastfeedng, so in the end I had to rely on information from social medias, forums and online parenting websites. They had all helped me one way or another, but none had given me the confidence like what my own mother had told me.

When I had finally managed to grasp my mother’s words of wisdom only then  that I found myself easing into motherhood and breastfeeding seems to be a little more easier and this progressed on as the days went by. I also made it a point to call my mother every now and then just to talk and I found that by expressing how you feel and hearing someone responding to you instead of getting an electronic reply can really do wonders! It’s like chicken soup for the soul.

Fast forward 3 years and 9 months, I am proud to say that my mother’s words of wisdom had saw me through to exclusively breastfeed my child and last week was my daughter’s last time that she had asked to nurse. Coincidentally, it was also about the same time which I had stumble upon Peaceful Parenting’s blog about “Why African Babies Don’t Cry“  . In this article, the writer, Dr J.Claire’s grandmother had also given her the same advise my mom had given me and I had shared it on my Facebook Fan Page

In her article, Dr J. Claire’s  grandmother’s advise was simple, “Nyonyo (breastfeed her)!” It was her answer to every single cry/fuss.

Did you “Nyonyo” your baby as well? Did you receive any valuable advise from anyone?