If This is the Story on the Front Page Then Malaysia Must Be in Pretty Good Shape!

Maid Squeeze

The headline of today's (January 10th) Star newspaper was "Maid Squeeze. Shortage Worsens With Cambodia Running Low." The article starts off- "some 35,000 families are being forced to do "a huge balancing act" as the shortage of foreign maids becomes critical with supply dwindling down to a trickle." Oh no! Say it ain't so!!

I guess that many Malaysian families have live-in foreign maids. The highest quality maids (meaning that they can at least speak some English) come from the Philipines. Until recently, most maids came from Indonesia. However, cases in which Malaysians have treated their maids badly have caused the Indonesian government to place a moratorium on women coming to Malaysia to act as maids. Indonesia will not end this empass until the two countries reach agreements on items such as minimum wage and days off for maids.

Now only about 200 maids are arriving each month to meet the needs of about 7000 maids per month. Recently, Malaysia has started to import maids from Cambodia. The Cambodian government requires that women be at least 21 before they can leave to work as maids and apparently that pool has started to dry up. The Malaysian government wants Cambodia to drop the legal working age to 18.

Complaints about maids and the lack of maids is common in the newspapers here. It cracks me up to hear women complaining that girls from mountain villages in Cambodia that do not have running water are incapable of taking care of their household properly. Maids from Cambodia make about $188 US per month (maids from the Philipines make about twice that) plus room and board. Most large condos and houses have a "maid's room" (I call them "slave quarters") and a "cozy" maids bathroom (in which you could conventiently sit on the toilet and take a shower at the same time). I am still not used to watching families parade through the mall with their maid in tow carrying all of their purchases or watching the maid tending the children while the parents loung around the pool or at the beach. I hope that Malaysian civilization is not brought down by the lack of cheap domestic help!!