Live in our Live out

Recently had an interesting debate with cousin-in-law about live-in or live-out maid is better. Reason this topic came up was because the Indonesia government are working to implement no live-in Indonesian maid from 2017 onwards. I guess the intention was to ensure the maids have proper working hours and social life. Also, in case of any abuse or unwanted situation happened, the maids have ways to call for help.

I was not debating whether which way it should be but rather have anyone asked the girls themselves what is their preference? Now, please understand I am purely debating from the point as a Malaysian and not about how other countries treat their maid. And the information of how the ME treat their maids, frankly, I hope someone will shoot them.

As Malaysian, although we are not well-off, my parents on several occasion to take on live-in maids. Those days, only readily available are Indonesian maids. Philippine maids are story for the rich back then. And most of this maids, are probably 18 or 19 years old only. It was the first time they have even been out of their village, what more to say to another country. Most times, mom have to teach them how to turn on and off the light switch, use the stove, water pipe and so forth. They are that naive and the idea of them having to fend for themselves outside on the salary that they have, frankly, it is really inviting for trouble. Not to mention the possibility of being cheated...


Anyway, I am sure there are those of us that do prefer live-out maid that only comes certain hour every evening to help out with the housework and daily chores after office work. And I am not denying there are those that abuse their maids but I would think in Malaysia, most of us are basically good people and we treat human as human. We dont expect them to do more than what we are willing to do.

So, at the end, what I been asking over and over again, did we ask what these Indonesian girls what they want? Did anyone ask employers what they want?