Suzana, Indonesian Maid in Malaysia
Indonesia is only an hour and 45 minutes away from my home by ferry ride, yet economically it is vastly different from us. Rural Indonesians are so poor that thousands of young Indonesian women are enticed to work here as live-in maids.
While they are here, they put away the dream of dating, marrying and bringing up their own children. Rural Indonesian men are reputed to be lazy, irresponsible and unfaithful, many of these young women are already divorced with kids.
As live-in maids, they are paid only a few hundred of our money every month but the small amount is an amazing number to them. With that, they are able to buy their children’s schoolbooks, buy a land, build a house, buy farmlands and cows.
Suzana have lived and worked with my family for so many years that she is an extension of us. A few weeks ago, she felt a lump on her abdomen. An ultrasound scan confirmed that she has a 10cm uterine fibroid growing in her womb. Removing it would have been a simple hour-long surgery but to Suzana and her family back home, no one goes for surgery unless they are about to die.
We tried to persuade her that it is safe and uncomplicated to undergo the surgery here as the doctor had advised, but add to the mysteriousness of the uterine fibroid her sense of vulnerability for being in a foreign country without any of her mother, father, brothers and sisters, a longing for her hometown, a realization that in 2 years her only son will be all grown up and he had grown up without her for so many years of his life, Suzana packed her bags and was gone.
RSS
Twitter
Buzz
Facebook
Delicious
That’s so sad :( I remember my late grandmother’s ex-Indonesian maid who ran away one day because she was sick. She was very dear to us. She didn’t want us to send her to treatment for a skin rash that looked very dubious. When she ran away, but not before she cleaned the whole house like she never did before – even cleaned the ceiling and repainted the gate – then the next day she was gone!
Wow Elaine, that is such a committed maid you had! We hardly ever hear stories of such good and faithful maids. They should know that medical treatment is nothing to be scared about.
ahh..this is sad. The first maid that we had, ran away too….hopefully she will be treated! =p
Oh, Suzana didn’t run away. She made the decision to leave, my mum sent her to the ferry terminal to board the boat for Indonesia.
I hope she will seek treatment when she gets there.
Oh surely u all will miss her. How u all going to keep in touch with her?
Usually, she will call us when she reach Indonesia and give us her new phone number there. This time, she didn’t call.