A domestic worker does good

Not only has she ben­e­fit­ted from a non-profit’s help but she has also given back to help her own.

By ELEANOR YAP

Twelve years ago, Fil­ip­ina Cel­mar Palao (left) had very lit­tle con­fi­dence when she came to Sin­ga­pore to work as a domes­tic helper. She was not very seri­ous and had no clue what her future would hold. She shared: “I didn’t know how to behave in front of peo­ple; I was afraid of mak­ing a mess of things such as say­ing the wrong things and hurt­ing people.”

Over the years, she has worked with two employ­ers, with the most cur­rent being a French cou­ple (Anne Genetet and her hus­band who have four grown-​up boys (three of which live in France)) whom she has worked now for seven years. Today, at 39 years old, she is a dif­fer­ent per­son, all thanks to Genetet, her own deter­mi­na­tion and non-​profit organ­i­sa­tion, aidha, which focuses on finan­cial edu­ca­tion for domes­tic workers.

Intro­duc­tion to aidha

Palao’s story started all the way back to the year 2007 when Genetet found out about aidha and that it offered a one-​year course con­sist­ing of up to five work­shops cov­er­ing entre­pre­neur­ship, build­ing self-​esteem and man­ag­ing money. Genetet wanted more from her even at the begin­ning. She shared: “From the first day she started in my home, it was very clear to me that I wanted the years that she was going to spend with us to be use­ful for her. I didn’t want that after work­ing with us, she just trans­fers to another fam­ily. I wanted her to gain expe­ri­ence, skills, tal­ent, know-​how, any­thing that would make her more valu­able than before. … I want her one day return to the Philip­pines to be a suc­cess, not a failure.”

On Palao’s 32^nd birth­day, she was given a “sur­prise” gift of a full spon­sor­ship to the course and the oppor­tu­ni­ties it would later bring. Shared Palao, “My employer is really sup­port­ive. If it is a good thing, she would sup­port me on doing it.”

After she grad­u­ated from the course in April 2008, she was impressed by Dr Sarah Mavrinac, pres­i­dent of aidha and her lec­turer in the entre­pre­neur­ship work­shop. “I really admire her and what she is try­ing to do at aidha.” Dr Mavrinac spoke of an idea of a can­teen at aidha’s premises where vol­un­teers would sell food that they could make for other vol­un­teers and stu­dents who would come on Sun­days to attend aidha’s work­shops. The money would then go back to aidha and be injected into its pro­grammes. In May, the idea took shape and was called ‘Project Makan’ but Dr Mavrinac needed vol­un­teers to help out. She was get­ting a short­fall as on Sun­days, most vol­un­teers would head to church.

Palao loved the idea of vol­un­teer­ing and she explained, she could always go to church on Sat­ur­days if she had duty on Sun­days or even after her vol­un­teer work. “I felt that Sarah and her team give up their Sun­days at times to be with their fam­i­lies to do this work and help us [domes­tic helpers]. Why shouldn’t we also help out? We should con­sider giv­ing back,” said Palao.

The ini­tia­tive was a very infor­mal and not as organ­ised when it started, how­ever, it has grown and now the band of eight vol­un­teers who are domes­tic work­ers cook on the premises. “This oppor­tu­nity is very good for them. We are not using them. They are really gain­ing some­thing as they get to learn more about busi­ness,” explained Palao. The eight of them take on var­i­ous tasks includ­ing pur­chas­ing food ingre­di­ents, inven­tory as well as sales. They are also respon­si­ble for being cre­ative on their table designs where they place the food to sell. For the past eight months, Palao has been the man­ager of Project Makan and she proudly revealed that they col­lect $500 each month from sales.

On alter­nate Sun­days, she is involved in Project Makan from 9am to 2pm, and on the rest of the other Sun­days, she vol­un­teers at the aidha office doing any­thing from oper­a­tions, client ser­vic­ing, infor­ma­tion, tech­nol­ogy or reg­is­tra­tion. The team of vol­un­teers rotate on the var­i­ous areas of respon­si­bil­i­ties. She either takes the morn­ing shift which is between 8.30am to 1pm or opt for the after­noon shift which is from 1pm to 5pm.

She hap­pily shared all the knowl­edge she has gained from her vol­un­teer­ing respon­si­bil­i­ties: “If you are in reg­is­tra­tion, you get to do account­ing which I never learned before. You also have to be in charge of cash as it has to be safe at all times. In infor­ma­tion, you have to explain the work­shops to stu­dents and you need to know how to answer their ques­tions. In tech­nol­ogy, you need to set up the com­put­ers for the work­shops and if there is a prob­lem, you need to step in. In atten­dance, you need to check and add to the data­base and in oper­a­tions, you need to do logistics.”

Employer sup­port

She stressed the impor­tance of doing this vol­un­teer work – “The stu­dents need us as some­times they are afraid to ask or dis­cuss things. It is much eas­ier for them to con­nect with us as we are also domes­tic helpers. We are able to relate.” Accord­ing to Palao, there are less than 30 domes­tic helpers who help in var­i­ous ways at aidha. How­ever, she realises that all this work she is doing would not be pos­si­ble with­out her employer’s support.

“It would be very hard if I didn’t have this sup­port. Some­times when aidha has events on a week­day, my employer lets me attend,” said Palao.

From Palao’s vol­un­teer­ing work at the organ­i­sa­tion, it fur­ther inspired Genetet to start a help agency for domes­tic helpers and their expat fam­i­lies where they offer ser­vices such as to how to inter­view a domes­tic helper and how to have a suc­cess­ful hire. The agency also pro­vides a hot­line in times of cri­sis such as an acci­dent or sick­ness of a helper, poor qual­ity of work, loss of trust­wor­thi­ness, etc. Said Palao: “In the past, my employer didn’t under­stand what a helper usu­ally goes through.”

She added: “She and her fam­ily treat me with respect and as part of the fam­ily. I feel a sense of respon­si­bil­ity to them and I don’t want to get my employer into any trou­ble as I care about them.”

This care has extended to her “fam­ily” pay­ing for her to go to French school so she can immerse her­self in the cul­ture and the lan­guage. “I can now write and speak flu­ently. I used to go twice a week but it has been reduced to once a week as my employer felt that with my aidha vol­un­teer­ing work it would be too much for me to han­dle.” Her employer is also sup­port­ive of her new inde­pen­dence and her dream to one day own a café in her home coun­try. Plans are afoot on get­ting a loca­tion, how­ever, she refrained on putting an exact date on when she will leave Sin­ga­pore. “It is quite hard know­ing that one day I will leave but my employer wants some­thing for me. … If I don’t go after my dreams, all the effort and knowl­edge gained through aidha would have been a waste.”

She added: “I have now gained more ideas on how to run my busi­ness; I am more con­fi­dent in myself and seri­ous about plan­ning a future. Before start­ing at aidha, I couldn’t say no to my own fam­ily in the Philip­pines. Today, I am stronger and I know what I want. Vol­un­teer­ing has allowed me to relate to peo­ple and to have more insight into a per­son and how to behave in public.”

Agreed Genetet about Palao: “She used to be invis­i­ble as like most for­eign domes­tic work­ers in Sin­ga­pore. … When Cel­mar started with us, she used to look down at her feet when talk­ing to me with a voice that I could barely hear. Today, she holds her head up, she speaks clearly so we can com­mu­ni­cate bet­ter and under­stand each other.”

Palao’s story has not only inspired her employer to get involved in the plight of domes­tic helpers but she has along the way, con­vinced a few oth­ers at her French school to vol­un­teer at aidha. Asked what she would like to share with her own peers, Palao said: “As domes­tic helpers, we should do our part too. Respect of oth­ers, be respon­si­ble, know your lim­i­ta­tions, put your heart in your work and the peo­ple around you, think first before you say some words, focus on what you want for your life, your dreams and never give up. Do your best on your work and always think of the out­come if you make mis­takes, never harm oth­ers, and use your off-​days on a good cause that will guide and moti­vate you, inspire you, and make you feel that you are con­tented and happy about what you are doing.”