For me a cleaning lady and a nanny are not luxuries, but necessities. If you knew me, you’d know that if I didn’t have someone coming to clean my house, that I would most likely live in filth. A terrible confession, but this is how it is. So I’m super grateful to be able to afford help.  In Costa Rica I had a girl with me for over 5 years. I am extremely loyal and treated her like family. She was one of the hardest reasons for us to leave Costa Rica.

However, life moves on and we had to move to Guatemala. I mean, I can’t rearrange my whole life for hired help. So now I am in search of a good person to come to my house. Luckily for us, my son is old enough and I don’t need him to be nannied anymore like before.  With the help of my sister-in-law I was introduced to her mother-in-law’s cleaning lady who has been with the family for 5 years. Even though she would be coming from Guatemala City and charging me extra for the transportation, I was happy with that because she is trustworthy and I know her background. So we had her lined up before moving to Guatemala. She actually started coming one week before I arrived to work with my husband in the new house.

He told me, be careful she talks A LOT and she EATS EVERYTHING. Actually, “eats everything” were her words. Not that I care about her eating habits, but I do work from home, so I can’t get too tangled up in conversation.

So the plan was, since she works for others, I will have her here for the weekend. We have a maid’s room and she can stay there. This was arranged and as far as I saw she was very happy about earning extra money, because she has 2 kids and really is struggling, as she explained.

The first weekend, she arrived and immediately told me she can’t do Sunday. What can I say, so I just nodded. However, during the day, she talked and talked and talked and talked. By the end of her first shift, I knew all the gossip I DIDN’T need to hear about my sister in law’s in-laws lives. Which made we really wonder what is she saying about my family and me!

Then she ate. And when I say she ate, I mean, she arrived at 7 am. Immediately asked for coffee. At 9 am she asked for sweet bread. At noon she was ready for lunch, and before she left she asked if she can make some eggs.

The following week she canceled one day again. Finally, on the third week around, she canceled again and I knew it was time to look of another one, because, as I said earlier: I don’t clean, and my house was filthy!

So the new search began.

I live in a little residential and have gotten to know one of my neighbors quite well, she’s been a super help and I asked her if she knew anyone who can help me. It’s crucial to have recommendations, you just never know who will enter the house. At the same time, my son’s school has a guard and for some strange reason that day he asked me if I needed someone to work in the house. I said, “as a matter of fact I do.” He replied, “I’ll ask around and will tell you in 2 days.” We left it at that.

That afternoon, my neighbor introduced me to the other neighbor’s maid who recommended a lady and we arranged to meet the following day. For the rest of the day, I had things to do and my son and I went out.

Why is it important that we weren’t home? Good question!

The following day, I arrive to school with my son to drop him off and the guard ran over to me.

This is the way this conversation went:
Him: “I went by your house last night, but you weren’t home.”
Me: “What?”
Him: “I have someone for you.”
Me: “How did you get my address?”
Him: “The school gave it to me.”
Me: Speechless and furious!

I ran into the office of my son’s school. This is the way this conversation went:
Me: “Who gave you the right to give out my information!”
The startled school administrator: “He told us you guys had an appointment.”
Me: “If we had an appointment, why didn’t I GIVE him my address.”
The woman: “I’m so sorry, we really thought you told him it was alright. He had your cell phone number, so we thought you forgot to give him the address.”
Me: “How did he get my cell phone?”
She: “I don’t know?”
Me: “Who the hell is this guy? Now he knows where I live, he knows my son!”
She: “I’m so sorry, really. He’s been with us for 7 years and when he found out that you needed a cleaning lady, he got really excited and wanted his wife to work for you.”
Me, walking out the door in a state of numbness!

By now, I wanted to buy a new lock, and find a new school, but as the day wore on, I lost the anger, and believed in my heart that it really was an innocent mistake.  The following day, I ended up meeting the friend of my neighbor’s maid and she seemed pleasant and was recommended, so I obviously hired her!

So now, I had to break it nicely to the guard at my son’s school that I don’t want someone who is crazy eager and goes sniffing around to get my address, to work for me. I did it very politely and since then he has fully ignored me, which is fine by me!

THE NEW MAID

I hired the new lady to come 6 days a week, for 4 hours a day. Since I work at home, I’m super busy and have told her many times to please help herself to coffee and sweet bread. I’ve even laid it out for her. She said thank you and never touched it.

Out of the 4 weeks that she’s worked for me, she has said this: “Can I use this rag for the mop?”

She is so wonderful. She does a great job. She doesn’t say anything at all. I’m happy and she’s happy. On top of that, I try to give her a gift everyday, either it be food to take home, or some clothes or jewelry for her kids!

Now I just hope she doesn’t leave:)

Bio

Marina has been living in Central America for over 7 years and her site Travel Experta is all about traveling in Central America. Marina loves to help people plan the perfect vacation to this amazing part of the world! You can sign up for her RSS feed and join the fun on her facebook fan page and follow her on Twitter at @MarinaVillatoro.