Job Discussion Forums

[miski]

''KUWAIT: A Kuwaiti court yesterday sentenced to death a Filipina maid after she was convicted of killing her Kuwaiti employer's seven-year-old son by slitting his throat, a legal source said. Court documents named the woman as May Membrini.

She was accused of killing the boy last January, slitting his 11-year-old brother's throat as well and stabbing his 17-year-old sister. Afterwards she allegedly jumped from the second storey of her employer's home. A police source said at the time that Membrini - who had been in Kuwait for six months - had quarrelled with her employers.

The death sentence will automatically be appealed under Kuwaiti law. Death sentences in the state are carried out by hanging and they must be signed by the HH the Amir to be implemented.''


Childcare is cheap in Kuwait- but at any cost safety? I am lucky to have a great girl who has stayed with me for nearly 5 years. But for new comers please be careful.

[middleastman]

Sad though it is - and it was wrong, is it just me or maybe people in Kuwait and other GCC countries should LOOK AFTER THEIR OWN KIDS for a change instead of paying someone else to do it.

[miski]

[middleastman]

Why didnt you didnt you take the time to think about a sensible reply? Am I a racist? um no. Id love to know what youre using to make that smallminded assumption. As for the "grow up" comment do you know my age? very mature!

Now as for the original post- rather than making what could have been a sensible and informed comment, you copied and pasted one side of a story from a paper or website and gave it a VERY informed, intelligent and presumptive title.

In some other parts of the world (but not all) there are procedures to both train and vet people involved in working with children. Would you mind telling me what childcare qualifications your "girl" ( now theres a racist slur) has? I guess you'd rather pay someone pocket change every month than pay for a qualified person to look after your kids.

Next time you are going to blindly attack someone please use your brain. It is after all a sign of intelligence to accept that other people have different views than your own- jumping to a defensive stance like that really just makes you look silly.

[veiledsentiments]

Miski... look at the reality. How many Americans or Brits have a live-in nanny and/or a maid? I'd say maybe 1 or 2% tops for the US. Those are the only ones that could possibly afford it. In my many years, I have never known anyone personally who had live-in childcare in the US.

What percentage of Kuwaiti and Emirati and Qatari families have nannies? 100% of my students had them in their homes, so it looks like it is probably 70-80% if you factor in the bedu who still avoid the city.

In the US those who put their children in daycare do it out of the necessity of paying for the roof over their head. And after they pick up the kids after work, they are the ones who feed, bathe, and put them to bed - between doing the cooking and cleaning.

The glaring difference in the Gulf is that almost none of the mothers of these children are employed. We always wondered what these women did all day since they don't work outside the house, but have maids to do the cleaning, cooks to do the cooking, and have nannies to care for the kids.

This is not racism. I believe that the kids are the losers. Many of my students said that their brothers and sisters barely knew Arabic and this caused them major problems once they got to school.

Sorry, but I don't think having live-in servants is a positive thing... Through the years I saw way too much abuse of these women. And some of them crack like the one in the article under the abuse and kill others or themselves. It is a repressive, abusive system that reflects very badly on Gulf nationals.

VS

[miski]

[miski]

[veiledsentiments]

Poor defense of the system. Your responses do not help your argument at all.

Many American working mothers might prefer live in child care to a day care business... just so the child could stay in his/her own environment and it would save her time in the pick up/delivery. But this would be totally inaccurate for mothers that don't work. So, your argument that 100% of mothers would choose to have nannies if they could afford it is obviously ridiculous. Most mothers I know would never even consider allowing someone else to raise their children.

Now if you offer them someone to wash the dishes, do the laundry, and wash the toilets, they will jump at it... only a few perfectionists wouldn't jump at that offer. Personally, I never had a maid in the Gulf because I prefer my privacy and find it easy enough to clean up after myself.

And BTW... stop with the overstatements. No one here said that "All Arabs treat their maids badly." But you are being blind if you don't admit that way too many do just that. No one suggested that this maid's murder of the children was justified... but sanity is an easy thing to lose. Mother's do it too and kill their own children... siblings do it and kill their brothers or sisters. No sane person kills children.

VS

[miski]

I agree- the maid is there to primarily look after the house, but if she is able to care for the kids why not. I have seen it work, and work well and I will not cave in to people who attack my belief because my argument is not thought out properly. I don't debate I simply say what I feel. I thought it was a cafe, not the UN for god's sake.

[trapezius]

I don't even want to start on this issue, because once I start, there is no stopping me. However, I would like to leave you all with a job ad (for Riyadh) from learn4good dot com, posted by a private family:

[miski]

Did it happen to say what nationality the family were ?

Before you all start attacking me because I have a maid, let me say that I am not for one minute defending the muhajababes who have 5 children and then sleep til 12, lunch , sleep til 5 , go to the gym, then the coffee shop, then shopping, then watch soaps til 4 am and sleep again, NOR the Dubai Ladies Set who leave baby at home and go to take morning coffee at the British Ladies Society or whatever, lunch, play bridge,gym and shop ( for they do it too), while a maid cooks, cleans, educates, potty trains and all else.

I can't afford to pay for a house, school fees, clothing AND send my toddler to a nursery run by an expat who charges EXTORTIONATE fees simply because my son will come out having been an English supervised 'happy chappie'. So I choose to employ a maid to help care for him. What is the big deal?

Some of us do that,work goddamn hard AND potty train, do bath time and read godnight stories. Don't tar everyone with the same brush.

[trapezius]

Saudi [of course].

Whether the household income is 2,000/month, or 200,000/month, a Saudi houehold has at least one maid/servant/slave. And this goes for 90+% of Saudi households.

The rich ones of course have several, one for each kid, plus one for each type of job (cooking, cleaning, laundry, etc). In a way, that's actually better, because when there is only one, that's when it becomes slavery and bonded labour. Imagine one person feeding, bathing, and clothing children, doing laundry, cleaning the house, and perhaps cooking.

They work 15-20 hours a day (newspaper accounts), and eat leftovers.

Absolutely speaking, this is despicable and unexcusable. Relatively speaking, this is how it has been throughout history in most countries. US had slavery, and it took a long time to end it. SA outlawed slavery in the 1960's, so we can't really chastise them for having this mindset just after 40 years of it being outlawed. Give it another 60 years.

If by then, it is still the same, then yes, it would be one of the worst such cases in human history.

[miski]

Then let's hang the House of Windsor and be done with it.

[veiledsentiments]

[miski]

It was here as a warning to prospective TEACHERS coming to Kuwait who might need child care.