The Help: Five things your maid wants to tell you

She is as integral to your life as your work and friends. Some even call her ‘family’. Your routine gets upset if she doesn’t turn up. And while you feel it’s easy to throw your weight around at her, you probably need her more than she needs you — your domestic help/maid. You may not be the boss from hell but a far better employer than your boss; however, unlike your year-end appraisal, you have probably never sat her down and asked her for feedback. In an attempt to comprehend their situation better, I sat down for a talk with ‘help’ from the neighbourhood. Here’s what they want to tell the didi, madam, bhaiya and uncles they work for. 1. I am the help for your house, and not for your man. Sandhya, 44, from West Bengal(ahem…Paschimbanga), just quit her year-long, part-time job. She had been working for a family of three — husband, wife, and mother in-law. Trouble began when the wife started working. The husband would often work from home while his mother would be on the ground floor of the four-bedroom duplex, busy watching daily soaps. One Friday morning, her madam’s husband put Rs5,000 on the table and asked her if she would go to bed with him, and not breathe a word to his wife. Sandhya was upset, took the money, and headed straight to the floor below to the mother-in-law. She told him her son had offered her money, to which the old lady broke down and cried and blessed Sandhya. She told her she knew her son was like this, and she was happy she had refused him. Sandhya knew the mother-in-law’s reaction wouldn’t amount to any action, so she asked for her dues to be cleared immediately after. [caption id=“attachment_78374” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“You may not be the boss from hell but a far better employer than your boss; however, unlike your year-end appraisal, you have probably never sat her down and asked her for feedback. AFP Photo”]  [/caption] Kaliya, 38, from UP, says, “Most of my friends have been made a pass at by the men of the house they work at. If they are working part-time, the chances they’ll come across such despicable behaviour become higher. I worked at a place where after the didiji I was working for passed, the husband started behaving strangely. Two weeks after she died, I went to the house and was mopping the floor of the master bedroom when I saw the sahibji had unzipped his pants and was pretending to sleep. I let it pass the first day, but the second day when the man was again apparently asleep and pretended that the sheet had slipped while he turned, I freaked out when I saw him in stark naked. I would get there at 7 every morning and didiji’s son was always decent. The next day I told her son that I couldn’t continue any longer because I was overworked. I had no choice I couldn’t tell a grieving son that his father was losing it?” 2. If you expect me to do a good job, provide me with the essentials.  How am I to work if you give me a quarter of a soap bar to clean a mountain of dishes? Suruchi, 32, says, “I have been telling my didiji that I need washing powder and a little more soap to clean but she routinely ignores me and has the gall to scold me when the dishes aren’t cleaned properly. Moreover, the dirty pans are never soaked in water. It makes it harder to clean. A bar costs not more than Rs10 and while she can spend a bomb on clothes and jewellery, she cringes every time I so much as mention it.” 3. Our mere presence won’t contaminate your food. It’s sad how much of a difference being ‘in control’ can make. Sneha Yadav, 35, mother of two and housewife says, “I don’t eat when my maid is doing the housework. The mere thought of her looking at what I eat makes me feel like she is casting spells.” Sneha is a graduate from Delhi University, an MBA, and was working for a software company before her sabbatical and current preoccupation. This is nothing new, as Greeshma, 29, points out. Her madam ensures she uses steel utensils when eating and always washes it with hot water. Also, she is not allowed to wash it in the same basin. And that’s not it; she has to have a shower before she starts cooking every morning. The shower bit doesn’t seem like a problem though since the water supply in her area is dodgy, she says while laughing. However it hurts and is ironic when she sees the family treating her like an untouchable when she’s actually the one putting food on their table. Continues on the next page 4. Like you, even I need time off. Anita, 35, has been working for 10 years and can count the number of leaves she has taken on her fingers. Ten to be precise! She says, however, that this year she is ensuring things change. Her daughter fell sick three weeks ago and it obviously required visits to the hospital and taking care of her child. When an obstinate and clearly heartless madam refused to give her three days’ leave, she said goodbye. Anita says, “For Rs1,000 for mopping and sweeping she hasn’t bought me. I decided after this incident that wherever I work next, I will ask them to give me two days a month as leave. In the off-chance that I don’t take the offs, they should then carry over.” All her friends look at her with awe and think it’s a brilliant idea. 5. Treat me like a human being For most full-time maids, the problems are aplenty. Krishna, 48, was harassed by her memsahib. The memsahib worked for the UN and often had social-worker friends who would drop in. What her friends did not know was that memsahib would never flush the toilet after using it, and was so sick in the head that after Krishna had taken off for two days on account of being sick, she came home to find the commode full of rotting waste. The mother-daughter she worked for would routinely give her leftover food and she wasn’t allowed to eat fresh food that the part-time maid cooked. After a year of mental torture, she finally quit when she had saved enough money to send back to her village and take some time off. Fact is, you open the newspaper and almost on a daily basis you are bound to find some news on how the help of the house is tortured. So while US box office records are going into a tizzy thanks to the success of the movie adaption of the 2009 novel, The Help by Kathryn Stockett, anxious cinema goers looking forward to the release here need to apply lessons from the 60s into the 2011 of India.