Havent wrote anything recently as we were busy with a few things.
1.Getting Kayzia into Pri 1 next year. A brain damaging exercise, which school, the distance, which phase is available for us and so on. Maybe I will blog abt this later on.
2.Preparing myself for WAST(squash) in Dublin in 3 days time which was sadly cancelled 2weeks ago due to poor respond. It was also thru competition, that i picked up running (which i hate doing as long as i can rem). I have being running since May, 2-3 times a week.
3.Having a new helper(maid) and eventually sending her back home!
Modesta was barely with us for the past 2 months. She is honest and sincere and she cares for the kids. She is a believer and reads her bible often.(er, but sometime at the wrong time, like at 8plus 9ish, when we actually need her help with the kids or housework.) We felt we could leave the house to her by herself and not worrying about anything else.
Problem started when her pastor husband could not handle the stress of caring for their 4 kids,(9,8,4,3) and not have her around. He called her often. Said he is sick, something to do with his brain(which i agrred), got cancer. We offered financial assistance for him to go for the required scans which of course he rejected. However the doctor did give him a M.C. that indicated, "complete rest needed" without any other explanations. I thought what the doctor said was this "completely healthy, nothing wrong, wife needed thou". We asked if their slibings could help. Mod's couldn't as they are far off from her place and her other sister nearby has 2 kids and one more popping out anytime soon. Hubby not in good terms with his slibings. In fact they wanted to charge Mod $$$ for taking care of their kids in his period of rest. We offered Mod financial help if she needs to get a helper to take care of her kids as she take cares of us as our helper(make sense?). We left the decision entirely to her. We went thru all the possibilities but I know we are fighting a losing battle. As stories of husband crying and laughing in the room by himself, trying to walk to the main road to get himself killed surfaced.... We know it is time for her to go.
We felt sorry for her cause she has spent her saving to get to Manila and so on. She also has a $600 debt with us. Thank God for the church and MaFoo who signed her up for the Western Union grant, which she got it!($500). She could pay us back a portion of her debt as we forgive her of the remaining amount. At least she has a bit of money to bring back home. (and gifts from us to the kids, not the husband thou....)
We realised a few things. Modesta was introed to us from our frd's helper who had good intention to help us. Seem like getting a helper directly and not thru maid agency may not be the wise thing to do.
They are not obligated to finish the contract as they do not owe any money to the maid agency. So the bad thing is, they can leave anytime. But got contract leh! er, do u want to force them to force u to send them back home at the expense of your kids?
I realised MaFoo has to instruct her every morning on what to cook for dinner before she leaves for work. At times, we had to tell her what to do at home, she was not well-trained as a helper. when my parents and friends came to my place, she didnt serve them anything to drink. Once I was busy with the kids, as i came out of my room, she was reading the newspaper in the LIVING ROOM, and many times, she read the bible in her room at night. I am like, u got the whole day at home right? cant u read it in the afternoon? Of course, i didnt blast it out. I wont go into more details as I have sent her back home on the 2nd Aug. But somehow i felt, she was here on holidays than to work. But dun get me wrong, I still think she is a nice person, but not a good helper.
So MaFoo and me had interviewed different helpers. We met one that said the agent threaten her with a gun(we got to know from Mod as she helped to interview her privately in another room as we are talking to the agent), when we asked her some basic questions, she kept saying, "hm, hm, hm, i nervous." I almost said, "quick say, or i take out the gun!". Another said she likes to care for young kids but her agent told us that her ex-employer fired her cause she dunno how to care for young kids. We asked her what went wrong, she cant answer us but insisted she is good with young kids. Sure! We called another (phi)who used to work in Jordan, she sounded confident and we thought she is the one. All this happened in the week Mod was leaving us. Our good friend Mable also introed this good helper to us but she is only free from Oct. Then another agent, Doris called, said there is a transfer helper(Tini) availble anytime, asked if we have time to "view" her. (i asked MaFoo, were we getting a flat or helper?". We got auntie Lisa( MaFoo's auntie) to come along for "viewing". We all had a good 1st impression, but how can we know from just one "viewing"? Mabe we should wait for the Oct one? We told Doris we will "reserved" her first, will decide in a few days. I know this story sibei long and boring,going to finish soon.
3 days later, Auntie Jen called MaFoo, "Ah Mel, wa wu ji ye maid tay wa ye chun(Mel, i have a maid at my place),ji ye ho(this one good), hardworking, well mannered. lai tek!,(come take!)"
MaFoo asked " Simi name, ok, will tek her"
A. Jen went "called Tini, quick called Doris"
MaFoo "Tini?!?!"
Doris and A. Jennifer(my best friend, Gin Kai's Mother) are good friends. A. Jen helps Doris to train her maids at A.Jen's home. Turned out that tini stayed with her for the past 3 days. We decided to take her as A. Jen has years of experience in this field. She has a better "view" than us.
Tini came right after Mod left on Sat.
The house is much much cleaner. She dun read the newspapers, she is very hardworking. Single mum,Indo, speak english, can cook very well (MaFoo and I have been looking forward for dinner everyday! and MaFoo dun have to tell her what to cook everyday.) and the kids like her...
O lord let her be the one......
How to get a good helper/maid?
I dunno also... pray loh......
help help
Hi Aunty Tini
