Tell us your own yaya stories.
While commenters wage war in the social media over Alex Tizon’s last article—even in the antisocial media we can hear the gnashing of teeth—let’s talk about our own histories with domestic helpers, maids, yayas.
We had a succession of maids and yayas in our house when I was growing up, but none of them lasted very long. They usually up and left over non-payment of their salaries (an option Tizon’s “Lola” never had). My family had the middle class accoutrements without the middle class income (I was on scholarships, which is how I can use accoutrements in a sentence). Had we been in the same situation as Tizon’s family, the same thing might have happened to our maid. So I’m not in a position to pass judgement on his choices. I’m glad Alex Tizon was able to write this story and send it to his editor before his sudden death. Also I hope that the laws protecting kasambahay are enforced and that the feudal arrangements that continue to exist in our country are ending.
Read some of the responses to the piece here.
Having been yaya-less, I was usually a latchkey child from age 8 onwards. The experience may sound sad to some, but I remember those being happy times. After the school bus delivered me to our house, I would let myself in, make myself a peanut butter sandwich, and sit down to watch Sesame Street. Cookie Monster, Grover, et al were my yayas. After Sesame Street came afternoon movies on RPN-9—Dog Day Afternoon, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Jerry Lewis movies, even Take the Money and Run by Woody Allen—then Sigmund and the Sea Monsters and the Adam West Batman. By which time my mother would be home to remind me to do my homework, which I’d already done on the school bus. Then my father would arrive, tell me TV was bad for me, and switch to the basketball games. When I think about it, the hours I passed alone were the most fun. That is why I like being alone.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
May 20th, 2017 at 10:11
My parents tried to have a maid once but it didn’t work out. My mother didn’t like how she did the household chores. She never liked how anyone did household chores so she did it all herself. She’s in her 70s now and thankfully lets other people do those things.
Nagulat ako na may outrage palang nagaganap sa article ni Alex Tizon.
May 21st, 2017 at 04:32
no yaya stories but have several comments or thoughts about the reaction that the article got. i wasn’t surprised by his story. i understood where they were coming from. doesn’t mean i agree, it’s just that i’ve grown up seeing that was normal. we had 2 maids, sisters who stayed with us for years. one stole from us and eventually left. the other had a full time job as a seamstress. so it got to a point where she stayed with us for free in exchange for doing the laundry. during all that time, my mom washed her own car and waxed and scrubbed (bunot) her own hardwood floor because, just like howcomebubblegum’s mom, she had her own standards. which also meant i got used to doing things on my own – washing the dishes and eventually cooking. (never learned how to clean the toilet though)
anyways, just like the article below, i can’t stand the power dynamics and can’t bring myself to ask someone to do something for me, even if i’m paying them. living in north america, it’s common for people to do their own chores so there’s nothing to it.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-39986215
and so i’m not angry with the tizon family, unlike someone quoted in the article below. i grew up in a culture that made all that normal. it’s still normal. does it make it evil that i haven’t helped stop it? am i washing my hands off of it by saying i don’t participate and haven’t participated in that kind of relationship in a long time so that’s enough? i think for now it’s enough that i don’t judge anyone else.
http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2017/05/it-is-really-important-to-humanize-evil.html?mid=fb-share-scienceofus
May 22nd, 2017 at 10:36
sunflowii: Thanks for sending me the article in the first place. The Atlantic has published excellent pieces on the Philippines, including the one on seamen and bolitas that boggled everyone some years ago.
I remember as a kid listening to adults talk about friends and relatives who had migrated to the US and how hard their lives were in California, etc. “Wala silang katulong!” these adults exclaimed in wonder.
Today the idea of doing your own laundry, shopping, etc is as natural as getting your own place, which in my childhood was unheard of unless you were getting married.
But the idea that some people have less of a right to live their own lives persists. There’s the wife who has to put her husband’s needs before everything else, the child who must put all her siblings through school before she can make her own plans, the children who are their parents’ property and later their pension plans. The katulong mindset is still with us.
May 22nd, 2017 at 21:12
You’re very welcome, Jessica. It was so beautifully written. Some people have said that it wasn’t his story to tell. But it was a story of growth for this man with a lot of introspection that everyone can use more of. How else could he explain this if he didn’t include the very person that brought out their ‘evil’, made him realize his error and motivated him to do better?
Re: your last paragraph. I hadn’t thought of it that way, but yes. Pension plan and long-term caregiver. That’ll be harder to change as it goes against one of the 10 Commandments and also the Confucian philosophy of filial piety.
May 24th, 2017 at 16:07
We also had a succession of helpers while I was growing up. Most of them lasted for a couple of years, 5 years was the longest. I still keep in touch with some of them. I remember my parents paying some of them partly in money and partly in kind through tuition fee in pursuing a practical 2-year college course back then. The last we had was paid with money and was given SSS and Philhealth when the Kasambahay Law was implemented.
3 of them were hired to take care of me while both of my parents work. We did not really have a bad experience with getting one except that one time when I was locked alone in the house when I was a 4.
When my parents decided to retire, my father did all the cooking while my mother and I were tasked with cleaning. However, because of my dismal skills in house cleaning, and my parent’s hands-on approach in our small business, we still hired a helper who mostly takes care of the house when we are away, sends my sisters to school and helps my mother with the laundry.
To the best of my knowledge, even when we were in a dire situation financially, my parents always made sure that they are paid. It’s not much, but my parents regard our helper as our priority creditor. There was a time when one voluntarily resigned because she knows we can no longer afford it but my parents cannot bring it upon themselves to tell her to get another job.
In my mind, our helpers were not any different from any other relative who stayed with us for quite some time except they were paid.
May 25th, 2017 at 19:40
I grew up with very abusive maids, one of whom “trained” me to do all her chores in the morning before I went to school, and when I came back from school. I was six years old. My parents didn’t know about it because my mother was MIA and my dad was too perplexed about his marriage in shambles that he didn’t notice I was acting differently. And then at 12, I mustered enough courage to call out the maids for the years of injustice and told my dad everything. Eventually, when my mother was back in our lives, I told her everything too. Of course they were both mortified, but never really had the guts to confront the maids (one was a mayordoma of sorts, having been with the family since she was 13).
But life has a funny way of bringing forth some sort of justice. One of the maids died in her late 20s/early 30s due to kidney failure, the mayordoma, went back to her own family and last I heard, no one is fending for her now. Oh wait, I think her younger sister is taking care of her, but she screams at her, the way she did at me.
May 26th, 2017 at 21:46
We also had a slave. My family treated her better and worse than the Tizon’s treated Lola Eudocia. She was my grandmother’s, and I grew up calling her Nanay. She was my Mom’s and her siblings’ nanny as well as mine. We had up to four maids at a time aside from Nanay. This was aside from the coconut tenants who waited on us whenever we visited. I grew up thinking we were better than some people because we were who we were. That’s how my Titos talked. We should be proud because of our surname. It’s not as if we have proven anything or have served in anyway.
Nanay did not do anything, not as far as I can recall. Nor was she shouted at. She came and went as she pleased, this was after she had borne my grandfather and my grandmother’s brother a son each. Not that I knew it. I only knew that I wanted to give her the best possible life that I could give, not that she wanted my idea of best. I was feeling guilty without really delving into why I felt that way. No amount of money that I could throw her way nor any amount of time that I set aside for her could pay for the youth and the life that my family stole from her.
Her well-kept tomb and candles lit with love are all that I can provide for her now. And bitter tears.