mahirap talaga maging mahirap

Our helper just left for good. so we got a temporary one who's renting a room few blocks away. she's 20 years old, jobless, mom of 2 kids and married to a jobless 40+ yr old man. she's willing to work for us few hours in the morning to do the laundry and to clean the house, and another few hours in the afternoon to wash the dishes. just that.

the thing is, she's been asking for cash advance for almost everyday, not realizing she can be salary-less for the coming weeks. there was one time too when she volunteered her husband to clean the bodega for just a couple of hours, which was fine, but this man on his very fist day, demanded already for cash advance that's way beyond minimum wage pa. My mom has been tolerating until she got annoyed with it, so she talked to the new helper, and explained to her (the helper) that they can't go on like that everyday, as it's a habit that will put them to debt, and will consume our budget on the other hand.

eto naman ang sagot nya: "e pano naman po kami mabubuhay nyan!"

WTF?! when my mom told me that I was extremely aggravated. for one, she can't demand for more, infact we're the ones who should demand as she already owes us days-worth of work. two, it was never our obligation to feed them! it was just our responsibility to pay for whatever they work for. if they can't pay their bills and food and everything just because she wasn't able to get the cash advance/"bale" from us then she'd better not blame us and find other means right?! in the first place too, we don't get money from trees, we also work hard for it!

this reminded me of an old woman who also dropped by our house months ago asking if she could be a part-time labandera. my mom refused because we already had a helper that time. her response was something like "may bahay kayo, nakakabili kayo ng kung ano ano pero ako di nyo ako matulungan!"

F talaga! so it's like me saying to my boss: "grabe naman nakakapag UCC ka pero sakin ni 7-11 coffee di mo mabigay!" (tapos ang nasa job description e magprogram kapalit ang N-thousand na sweldo with no benefits) what could be more demanding and absurd and rude than that!? aba'y kung ganon masisisante nga ako at sasabihin rin ng boss ko "aba'y di ko obligasyon ang painumin ka ng masarap na kape!". maaaring magtimpi ako, mainggit, mainis o kung ano man, pero hindi ko sasabihin. diba!

So... kudos to those who work hard for their families, who have gratitude when given something extra, and who request for money in polite and sympathetic ways. these are the people we'd like to help even more. masarap bigyan ng bonus.

I remember this sampaguita boy who rode the jeep I was on, he sang and rapped to entertain everyone, enticing 2-3 ppl to buy his sampaguita (unusual right?). with the few left on his hand, he turned to me and said "ate... sige na... bente po ito pero sampu nalang po kung bibilhin nyo. para lang po maubos paninda ko...." yes he begged, not demanded. he didn't say "pano na po ako kung hindi kayo bibili!" or "nakakabili po kayo ng damit pero sampaguita ko ndi nyo po mabili!" get my point?!

so I bought everything he had. for 20 pesos. mabuti pa yung bata. sana di sha tumanda kagaya ng ibang nakakapang init ng dugong nakilala ko.

ang puso! gosh, babalik na nga ako sa trabaho ko. I just had to speak.