Confinement lady - A nightmare from Hell (Part 3)

Continuation from Part 2 ....

Confinement ladies have this tendency to try very hard to differentiate themselves and distance themselves from maids. It is as if they are trying very hard to position themselves above the maids (basically, all they wanted to put across is that they are not maids but professional and experienced personnel with the knowledge and experience to handle new born babies and their mommies)....

The first rule which they always try to establish the moment that they arrived is that they DO NOT and WILL NOT cook for the maid as well! The first confinement lady we had for Ryan tried to establish that but she was still reasonably friendly with our Indonesian maid. Mdm L stressed this as well. We have no problems with that and we took the extra precaution to warn our maid to stay out of her way for at least a month to avoid conflicts. BUT CONFLICTS there WERE APLENTY and this was when they could not even understood a word each other were trying to say....

One morning the confinement lady BARGED into our bedroom and angrily declared that she wanted to leave immediately. When my wife asked for the reason, she claimed that the maid eat her food! She claimed that the maid took her food in front of her! With a face as black as charcoal, she stormed back into her room, slammed the door shut, locked it with the baby Chenya inside! She basically sulked the entire day.

When we went down to the kitchen, the rice was left untouched (half way eaten) with her vegetables on the kitchen top. When we questioned our maid, she said she could not understand why the confinement lady was so enraged. We asked her whether she took the food from the confinement lady and she said yes but she said did asked! She said, she was trying to be friendly and had asked the confinement lady whether the food cooked was nice and took one piece to taste!

Anyway, in order not to make things worse off and not to stress any parties, we managed to pacify Mdm L and the maid.

Then comes the non stop complaints by Mdm L on how lazy and bad the maid was. She told my wife that my maid secretly crept into the baby's room and play with the baby and doze off in front of her and was caught by me. In actual fact, I was looking for the maid and found her playing with the baby in the baby room. (The maid adores the baby because she reminded her of her own daughter back home). Back stabbing and more back stabbing throughout the 28 days....

On another occasion, she angrily complained to my wife that the maid refused to let her use the kitchen and she is NOT cooking anymore! And we have both a dry and a wet kitchen! We asked the maid and the maid clarified that she merely try to ask the confinement lady whether she has finished using the kitchen because she has to cook for Ryan. Sigh.....So we divided and allocated the kitchens, the wet for the confinement lady and the dry for the maid!!!

The maid is without complaints either....

Every morning she would show me the dustbin of the amount of cooked rice that the confinement lady is throwing away. (The confinement lady refused even to leave the left over cooked rice for the maid to eat or fried but instead prefer to throw them away and she has been throwing away cooked rice for the entire 28 days!!!)

And the maid retaliated by purposely keeping pots and pans or containers that she knows the the confinement lady needs. So, when Mdm L can't find them, she would angrily complained to me or my wife ..."You go and ask YOUR MAID where she keep MY Pot. I can't cook without it!"

I jusy could not understand why they simply could not work together especially the maid is there to help her and to ease her workload. With the maid, she would not have to wash the baby's clothes, the mommy's clothes and the baby bottles. All these were taken care of by the maid. In fact, the confinement lady took all these for granted so much so that whenever she cleaned baby Chenya, she would simply just dump all the soiled clothes at the baby's room door to be picked up by the maid. She doesn't even have the courtesy to take it down to the wash area for the maid to wash....

Everytime, she finished cooking, there is literally no wet or dry kitchen in the house..... there are ONLY two VERY Flooded and WET kitchens!!! And the maid would be on standby with a mop sitting at one corner to wipe it dry the moment she finished her task....

Next...are they as knowledgeable as they claim they are???

Confinement lady - A nightmare from Hell (Part 2)

Continuation from Part 1 .....

Once we got home, the complaints started. Hardly 30 minutes, she came and complained that we do not have enough large pots for her to boil the stuff that she needs. Mind you, I have 2 large stainless pots, 2 medium size pots and 2 smaller ones. And that is besides the TWO medium size slow cookers. She wanted me to buy some extra pots! I told her no way. Use what we have as I am sure that they are enough. And she did manage the entire 28 days with the pots that I have at home without much of a fuss after that....

Next complaint was when I told her that we actually did buy some black beans as I have read one of my confinement recipe books where black beans are used in some of the recipes. She asked me if the black beans have been fried? I was like 'Huh? Fried?'. And she went on and said "How to use when they are not fried?". I was SO very tempted to tell her off ..."Am I not paying you to fry them and cook them? If I have already fried them, why the hell should I employ you?" ...but since this is only the very first day, I was trying so hard to keep my cool...I really don't want to make this an issue, knowing that if I am stressed out, my wife would be stressed out and the last thing I want is my wife getting into a post natal depression!!!

We have bought tonnes of cute clothes for Chenya and this became the second issue. The moment she went through the closet, she came and complaint that they are too many jumpers. She wanted us to get for her, clothes which are easy to wear. We told her that there are and she can used what she wants ...and she went on to give us a lecture of how inconvenient it is to give Chenya jumpers !!! (as if we didn't know)

Next...declaring war on our maid...!!!!

Confinement lady - A nightmare from Hell (Part I)

Chenya is now 1 month old. It has been a pretty chaotic and challenging month, not so much with Chenya but more so with the confinement lady that we got.

Honestly, if you ask me now, I would think that confinement is grossly over rated, overly expensive and more of a trouble brewer than a helper in the time when the least you need at home with an addition of a young little baby.

We had one for Ryan when he arrived. It was a last minute arrangement since Ryan arrived prematurely. We called one of those confinement centres and they arranged for Mdm C. We have heard nightmares before and hence we were already very apprehensive. She turned out OK though not without her share of problems at home.

So, when we were expecting Chenya’s arrival, we made sure that we book her in advance (6 months) ahead and requested banked in her RM500 booking fee (non refundable) and the price has increased from the previous RM3000 now to RM3300. It is as if we had a choice.

2 months before Chenya’s arrival, we called her to keep you posted and updated so that she would be prepared. One week before Chenya’s arrival, I gave her a final call to let her know that we are preparing for Chenya’s arrival on the 20th July 2011. And guess what??

She called back and she said that she can’t make it because her daughter is getting married and she is recommending another replacement! WTF!!!! Obviously it was too late now for us to find another replacement and we really do not want to force her to come since she is going to take care of the baby. Held by ransom, we reluctantly agreed with her assurance that the replacement would be a good one. (where have we heard that before??)

I had to pick her up (Mdm L) from Puduraya. On the way back home, she started laying down her ground rules that she will only cook for the mother and baby and that it is their rule that they will only work 28 days. She firmly made clear the date that she would be leaving and if chargeable if extension is required.

I told her that we have bought most of the Chinese herbs required and she was visibly and vocally upset that the various Chinese herbs were not separately and individually packed (ready to be cooked by the medicine hall). She said that she is NOT used to having to cooking without these pre-packed `recipes’.

I was thinking to myself, if you can only cook with pre-packed recipes, then I don’t need you since I can cook myself. Why on earth would I need to pay RM3300 for someone to buy pre-pack soup? WTF!!!

….to be continued …..

Baby Rabbit Girl

Being chinese, we always associate our year of birth to the animal sign of which we were born under and apparently, each animal brings with her, a unique character.

Well, in my household now, we have a pretty balanced group with the arrival of Baby Chenya. We used to have only one male rabbit which is me in the house and I always jest that I would always loose out in a fight if there is one since there are two rats at home...the big and fiery one, my wife and the little hyper active one being Ryan.

Now, at least, I've got another team member in the Rabbit team...Baby Chenya, the new female rabbit at home...Now, the rabbit team would have a better fighting chance at home...hehehehehehe...

A tender moment with Mommy

With the arrival of Chenya, needless to say, my DSLR has become very handy in grabbing pictures of our little princess on a daily basis. (Mommy's orders: Must have at least one picture a day).

Captured the above moment on day 16. Love the shot as it shows a tender moment between mommy and her child....

Planning now to do some baby portrait in the next few days. Really hope that it will turn out well....