(540) Paid labour vs family

A good percentage of my recycled clothes go to May, a Filipino maid friend of  mine. She would take my installments, wash them and store them. A few months before she returns to her home town for breaks, she would ship them back. If all go according to plan, the box would arrive on her second day home. Each of her children picks up one or two items they desire, then the villagers and relatives would each be invited to pick one item. If there is any left over after the first week, then the persistent ones would get seconds. Of course the hundreds of pieces of clothing passed over these few years are not mine, they are from friends, relatives, neighbours and church members.

May is a very blessed maid for she has very kind and fair employers. Therefore when other maid friends complain, she could hardly understand the grounds for such complaints. For instance, they grouse about eating left over food. May actually could not throw out extra food in her employers' household. She is mindful that had she stayed on in her home town, there are two months a year that her family would have no funds to buy even the basic rice for food. She voluntarily requests her Mam not to buy take away food as she wants to eat the day before's left over.

While others grumbled about having to wash one or two car each day, May washes three daily without her employers having to ask her to. She puts it this way, the clean and shiny cars are a testament to the fact that her employers have an industrious maid at home. Should the day comes for any of the cars to be serviced, Mam or Sir would tell her not to wash it. As the service center would wash it.

Still one or two of her friends are not happy that they don't get eight hours of sleep every night. May thinks that when her Mam works late, the least she could do is to keep the soup warm. May would stay up  to serve her when she returns. She no longer think that she is a paid maid with certain "rights". But rather May is a member of her Mam's family. Indeed this family is blessed with a loyal helper.