What Do You Think?

From Star Online,

I AGREE with both the views expressed in “Most Westerners can't afford a maid” and “Men and children should also do housework” (Sunday Star, May 23).

My daughter in Sydney is married to an engineer and they send their child to a baby-sitter. That costs them some A$80 (RM215) a day! How many of us can afford that?

And other services are also not cheap there. Like it or not, people have to live with it.

And, talking of maids, it is beyond them there. They are simply too expensive to be employed. Many have to do without them.

Maybe we Malaysians are a lucky lot, as we can still afford to have maids.

So we should not complain if Indonesian maids now ask for a little more. They deserve it.

And who says house chores are easy! Try it for a day, men, I challenge you!

So how do those in Sydney manage? They just do the daily chores, home and outside, themselves. Maybe this is what we should do here, and why not?

I have seen only women do everything at home. The men and children just laze around. I think this is not good at all.

This isn't fair to women. We have to strike a balance somewhat here. Then maybe we can live without a maid.

Mind you there are tonnes of work to be done in the house besides caring for the children. There is the laundry, the sweeping and mopping, cleaning the toilets, washing the dishes, the ironing, the cooking, dusting the windows and cabinets, changing the bed sheets, and the list goes on.

And why must men also do it alone? I like to see more children assist here.

Yes it is about time we learn to do something ourselves. We cannot be too dependent on outside assistance.

I am glad to say that I have a friend in Kuala Lumpur who assists his wife with the household chores almost daily and keeps the garden lively and flourishing. Yes, we want more of such people around.

The wife proudly revealed this to me on a recent visit. And she is happy that she herself does not have to do household chores alone, not since her husband's retirement.

Not only that, her husband now feels better doing chores.

So guys, this is something to ponder over.

BULBIR SINGH,

Seremban.

What do you think?

As for me, I am grateful that I can still afford to pay for a maid service. Both DH and I share the wages. House chores is indeed not easy to do and it's tiring.Been a working husband and wife, we appreciate time we have after work.It's priceless. It's only a few hours to spend with one another and of course with our daughter before she retire to bed. We are also blessed as both of us are in the goverment service. Less pay but we have time after 5.30pm all to ourself. I know some people who come home to see their children to sleep and leave the house even before their children's wake up. I don't like that kind of life.We chose to have maid mainly to look after Sona as she is too young to go to a day care and DH is against sending her to day care at such young age.If we are going to choose not having a maid and do all the daily chores, I can bet life will be stressfull. Personally I don't like to do all the daily chores that will drain my energy like doing the laundry, folding cloths, ironing ,sweeping and mopping the floor etc, etc. I rather use the time to read for Sona , play with her or even just lazing around with her. I think it's a choice ( provided you can afford to pay their salary) but if it's too much then nothing can be done and I will do the housework with DH and Sona.