All God's Children....

My brother, Mark, had told me before I left that the Filipino were the slave class in Saudi Arabia.  I didn't take that very seriously until I have seen it for myself here.

First, just after I arrived here, my friend, Moni, and I had gone to the IKEA store to pick up a few "creature comforts" to feather our new nests.  While we sat out front waiting for our driver we saw a Saudi man being helped by a Filipino store worker.  Now this Saudi had purchased a lot of things and they were big things like bookcases and such.  After the worker had spent quite a lot of time lifting all of those heavy boxes into the back of the fancy SUV, arranging and re-arranging, the Saudi man just drove off.  He never acknowledged the worker,looked at him,  offered a tip or even thanked him.  The working man just stood there looking so .....I don't know...dejected.  It was very sad.  If Moni and I could have figured out a way to give him a tip we would have.  I don't remember ever seeing that before.

At the hospital there are many Filipino sitters with the patients.  The families hire them to be company and care for the "loved" one.  I was caring for a patient the past two days who had such a sitter, named Esther.  I asked Esther how often she went home and what kinds of things she did her on her days off.  She shared with me that she doesn't get days off even if she is ill and hasn't been home in four years.  She told me she was a widow and had four children back home she was trying to support.  She had not seen them for four years.  She started to cry at that point.  She is exhausted.  She stays with this woman who has been in the hospital more than a year.  Other than for food and hygiene purposes Esther never leaves her.  She is terrified of being fired.

At work you hear the Saudi female physicians talk about their nanny and maid problems.  One doctor admitted to locking her nanny in the house and demanding she carry a cell phone that she must answer by the second ring.  The nanny escaped through a window and hasn't been seen since.  I hope they never catch her because the punishment will be terrible! There are stories about physical and sexual abuse toward these woman.

OK I realize America has had it's share of these kinds of crimes but I didn't grow up during that era and had never witnessed it.  I can say I have never seen a more dejected, hopeless, whipped people in my life and it is heart wrenching.

Christine xx