Charmin-Ultra: Don't Squeeze Me

Among people who are against globalization, expatriate wives are most eligible.

These days, you don't get a job in your town, but in another country. It is very likely that one day your husband comes home and says, "I am home, honey. Oh, by the way, I got transferred to Brussels and company wants me to get ready by next month." Next day, you will be packing and next month, you will be in a totally different country where you don't even know a soul, not to mention to speak the language. There is never a course or any manual of "how to be an expat wife" and I bet many just never think about it.

The husbands get assigned, get to the country and go on doing what they are doing. Wives, in the meantime, are in charge of everything. By that, it means, getting a place (they browse around with realtors, come back with a bunch of possibilities, and the husbands will make the final decision), finding school for children, and furnishing the house. All of these can be done in a month and by one person. No wonder some of them have to go to therapy. Expat package is usually nice. It covers housing, schooling, or even household electrical appliance, but there should be one for psychologist consultation fees.

Day 1

"Sawidika", comes in my cheerful maid, 'Lek'. She has worked for us for two months. In fact, to be exact, two months minus three days. These three days went to another maid we hired and fired. 'Lek' is not bad for a maid. Although she is not very keen on cleaning, she is good with my son. Ooops! This topic comes up without thinking. Yes, this is one of the popular topics among Expat's wives in BKK. How much is your maid? How good is she? What does she do? Live in or not?

BKK is the place for having maids. Don't be shocked and we are not rich. Everybody has a maid or maids in BKK. There are wealthy Chinese-Thai families who have 15 maids, 2 drivers, and one gardener. Or well-do Thai families with maids for each of their children and a driver. Modest expat families by not feeling too guilty, usually have one maid. And there maids for maids. An embassy butler might have a maid who shares the living room floor with the child.  

There are websites teaching you how to find a maid, how to train your maid and how to maintain your maid. If you still are not sure, there is a book called "Maid-to-order" A-Z. It covers every aspect from 'how to teach her to make a boiled egg' to 'how to mediate quarrels between maid A and maid B'. It is so thorough and considerate that in the back of the book comes along with a bilingual chart so if there is something you want your maid to do like 'mop the floor three times a day', you can just point. If you don't like your maid, at the end of the chart, just point at 'You are fired. Give back my key and get out of my house'. How thoughtful!

Anyhow, as a modest expat's wife, one my first mission is to find a maid. I have done research on the internet, looked in the newspaper, and asked around among friends. Finally, I nailed down some possibilities. Now we have to meet the candidates. Phone calls. Appointments. Interviews. Usually, the candidate will come with a friend especially if they don't speak English, not that the friend's English is understandable. This friend is, I guess, acting as an agent and maybe gets a brokerage fee from the small salary.

So you check the references. You check out the person. And if you have children, see how they interact. Talk about terms. Then you say 'OK, start tomorrow' and as soon as they leave your house, you wonder if you have made a right decision.

When your maid comes, you start to compare her with your neighbor's. The Madams drink coffee and discuss about the maids while the maids gossip how terrible their Madams are.