In the earliest letters I sent to my family after we moved to the Philippines, I wrote about all the touristy things: the hot weather, the juicy mangos, the ornaments on jeepneys. “We rode in one jeepney,” I wrote, “that had horses, Jesus, Mary, half-naked women, and Che Guevara on the hood.”
Right from the start, though, it was obvious that being an expatriate was not at all like being a tourist. Expats don’t just observe a culture different from their own, they become part of it.
The first big change in our lifestyle happened the day after our arrival when Nellie, our newly hired maid moved in with us. You’d think one maid would be enough, wouldn’t you? But there was one important thing I hadn’t counted on.
None of the houses we looked at had washers and dryers.
When I mentioned it to the real estate agent, I noticed a hint of impatience showing through her professional smile, “We hire lavanderas here in the Philippines,” she said. “Hand washing is much safer for your clothes, you know.”
Later I learned other reasons lavanderas were preferred over washing machines. Most appliances were imported and therefore costly. Electricity was expensive and unreliable. And, due to a high birth rate, labor was cheap and readily available.
Two-months later we finally found a house. Like all the others, it lacked a washer and dryer. So we hired our second maid, Clarita.
Clarita and R at the beach
I’d washed clothes by hand before. But washing the occasional sweater by hand had little in common with the job Clarita did. First she soaked the clothes together with bars of laundry soap in large plastic basins. Then she scrubbed and squeezed them, rinsed them in a sink in the breezeway, wrung them out, and hung them on the clothes line.
In the afternoon, she ironed aprons, dresses, T-shirts, my husband’s shirts and slacks, towels, cloth napkins, and even our underwear and the baby‘s diapers.
With five people in the family plus two maids, we always had lots of laundry. The baby, with her cloth diapers, was a big contributor. (It was 1971, and disposable diapers were still a novelty.)
I felt strange, maybe even guilty, about having two maids. Was I lazy? Was I taking advantage of the inequity that existed in the Philippines and the world? Or was it a good thing to provide jobs for these two young women?
Before we left the Philippines twenty years later, there were more washing machines and fewer lavanderas. Also, there were many Filipinos leaving their families to find work abroad.
That’s automation for you.
We’ve experienced similar results in the United States. When I was a new driver, pumping gas was a nice beginning job for young men. We drivers just sat in our cars while the gas station attendant pumped our gas, cleaned our windows, and checked our oil.
We weren’t lazy. That was the way it was done in those days. In fact, it’s still against the law to pump your own gas in New Jersey. In Oregon you can only pump your gas in rural areas at night.
Another example of automation leading to job loss: One of the jobs that helped pay my college tuition was driving a dump truck during the pea harvest. That job is gone now, along with the jobs of the tractor driver that cut the pea vines and the other tractor driver who spread the pea vines on the stack after I dumped them. Today an enormous machine drives slowly through the fields doing it all.
That’s automation. That’s life.
Clarita went to Mindanao with us.
But in the early 1970s, Clarita had a job and a home in our house. It was a good situation for me. I think it was also good for her.
Have you always had a washer and dryer? How about your mom and grandma?
This post is part of a series inspired by the letters my mom saved. See also: The Letters My Mom Saved and “Everyone” Has a Maid (or Two or Three).
Next post: Crossing the Mts., Scenes of Eastern Washington
My grandmother had a wringer washer out on the back porch. I don’t know if it was electric or gas powered.
My mother began with a wringer washer and switched to a “modern” one when I was eight. That would have been 1951.
When we were first married, I used a wringer washer in a mice-ridden basement below our apt. I HATED it, mostly because of the mice!!!
I don’t remember my mom’s early washer, but I do remember that for a time my grandma kept a wringer washer in her basement. I think by then she already had a “modern” washer. But I do remember the story she told about someone getting her long hair caught in the wringer.
Ugh! Mice. At least they weren’t rats. That would have been toooo much.
OMG. Laundry. Why didn’t I guess? In Ecuador, we had a machine, but none of us used it because our landlady charged us too much. So we went out back and handwashed our clothes in a shallow concrete and tile sink built specifically for that purpose. Let me tell you, jeans are not fun to handwash!
When I moved to Thailand, I sadly discovered that there was no washing machine in our apt so we were at the mercy of laundry shops. They can be a bit unreliable and expensive so I ended up doing washing in the bathroom, with plastic tubs, squatting local-style. Gah!
A lot of SE Asians prefer to handwash their clothes. Our old landlord had 2 maids for their washing. I’ve heard that some believe that the machine “doesn’t do a very good job.” My aunt has a machine we bought her, but she still prefers to handwash!
Jeans would definitely not be fun to handwash. But washing them certainly would be a good way to build muscles in your hands and arms.
You mentioned squatting local-style in Thailand. Now that I think about it, squatting must be better for a person’s back than bending over a sink. People who are used to squatting seem to be able to do it for long periods.
Some of us find it hard to trust our machines. I still wash my dishes before I put them in the dishwasher.
You’re sooo Asian…washing your dishes before putting them in the dishwasher. 😛
Gotta love a hand written letter and a handwritten history about life experiences. (Don’t know if you caught my recent post about this topic! !) I certainly recall getting full service at a gas pump which was especially great when you had a car full of kids! Who knew it was such a luxury? Interesting post!
I just went back and read your post, Mail and the Written Word. Thanks for reminding me. I really enjoyed it.
Now that phone calls are so inexpensive, I call my daughters rather than writing. Phone calls aren’t the same, though. I think we talk about different things than we would include in a letter. Writing a letter requires one to step back and make some sense of whatever happened since the previous letter. It’s a different process. And, of course, it leaves no record–(unless you’re planning a crime and the FBI finds a way to look into your phone records. Just joking.)
Ha ha! I absolutely love phone calls with the ‘kids’ and letter writing with them would not be the same. A time and a place in our changing world-just like your lavendera! Time marches on-and with it… changes!
If you EMAIL your kids/friends, you have the advantage of a record without the tedium of handwriting. I don’t save EVERY email to My Journal, but I save those I think I should keep–those that tell what I’ve been doing, etc. it seems efficient to me–it saves time and I can include photos.
Very clever! My trouble is, I don’t email my kids much–just very brief notes. We talk on the phone. It’s too bad. I do have a few old letters from my kids. Looking back on them, they seem so well written and witty–a joy to read.
I never thought I’d have a gardener until I moved to Los Angeles! As soon as we moved into our small house on a big corner lot, the neighbors’ gardeners began offering their services. Apparently one doesn’t mow one’s own yard or rake one’s own leaves here.
Times have changed. When I was growing up, no one had a gardener. My mom did lots of planting and weeding; I did lots of mowing. Neither of us really enjoyed it. Now I live in a planned community which hires a team of gardeners to care for the common grounds. My theory is that many services like gardening and window washing are hired out these days because there aren’t many stay-at-home wives anymore.
I’ve always had a washing machine, but I’m only 32. Not sure about when my mum was born (in 1961). They were 7 sisters and 1 brother so I hope they had!!
We have never had a dryer though. It’s not really needed in Spain, we have sun most of the time and clothes dry pretty fast on the clothesline.
Drying clothes in the cloudy, rainy Seattle area was always a tricky business.
Wow, life was quite a bit different in the Philippines than the U.S. in the 70’s.
I remember in the late 60s my oldest sister was stuck with the laundry (using a wringer machine, line drying, and ironing for six kids and two parents) while my parents worked. 1970 and 71 we used the laundromat about 15 miles away. By 72 we updated to a regular washer and dryer; the four oldest kids were on their own by then and my mom took over the laundry.
We’re lucky. It wasn’t that long ago when doing the laundry was a big job for ordinary people. It’s still a big effort for some people. I saw something on CNN this week about two Australian men who set up a mobile laundry for the homeless. https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/mar/30/clean-streets-mobile-laundry-service-australia-homeless-orange-sky
We always had a washing machine, but not a dryer when I was a child.. There were 10 of us (Mom & Dad, Gramma & Grampa, my five siblings and myself). I remember the wringer washer and Gramma pouring Clorox in hot water in the sink and then adding the whites. She would “stir” them with a broom handle and after the bleaching process would squeeze the hot bleach water out and put them in the washer. I loved watching as she guided the laundry through the wringer. In warm weather all of the girls helped Mom and Gramma hang the laundry. The girls were charged with handkerchiefs, pillow cases, wash cloths, and any other small items on a lower line, while Mom and Gramma put the large items on the upper line. In the winter, since we had a small damp fruit cellar instead of a basement, the clothes were hung throughout the house. In warm rainy weather, the screened porch was filled with wet laundry. Laundry day never ended with that many people living in one house. We were always sorting, washing, drying, folding, ironing, and putting away fresh laundry. Thankfully, when I was in junior high, my Dad surprised us with an electric dryer.
Those were the days! With ten people, you must have had lots of laundry. Helping hang it out to dry on a sunny day must have been a pleasant task. Rainy days, with damp clothes all over the house, would be a different story. Thanks for sharing your laundry memories.
A couple years ago, when our washing machine broke, I thought of the stories my grandmother told about washing clothes in the creek. Just last night, Derek and I were talking about the gas pumping law in New Jersey.
Wow! Washing clothes in the creek would be a backbreaking job. I hadn’t heard about the New Jersey law for a while, so I looked it up. I’m amazed it’s still in place.
Okay, I really want that ‘jeepney’ for driving around Mukilteo. What a great experience you have had in this life journey. Cheers, Mindy
Jeepneys have an interesting history. They began as surplus jeeps left behind or sold on the black market by the Americans after WWII. They were stripped down and altered locally. They’re actually a very useful part of the transportation network. If you’re going just a few blocks, you hop on a jeepney. They’re everywhere and they’re cheap. You might take a jeepney from your home to the bus stop. There are longer routes, too. But mainly they’re good for filling in the gaps. Wouldn’t it be nice to have something like that here!
I surely grew up with laundry machines as I am just a bit shy of being 30 years old now. With my mother it is another situation though as she was born in 1945 in rural Finland. Back then laundry machines existed but only wealthy people had them and it wasn’t till the end of the 1970’s till my mother had her first one. Back in her youth she helped her mother to do the laundry besides being busy with farm work from early morning till evening.
Do you still have any contact with your former maids/ kept contact for some time? This whole story makes one wonder how the lives changed later on
It’s amazing to think about how hard your mother most have worked in her youth.
I’ve made contact with a couple of our former servants on Facebook. One is still single and working as a nanny in Australia. Nellie’s brother, who worked for us for a while, was eager to get married and to learn to drive so he could become a taxi driver. Now he’s a beloved grandfather to many beautiful grandchildren. In his pictures on Facebook, he looks like the patriarch of a joyful clan.
Social media surely has its benefits with these kinds of things. To see what happens to people you haven’t seen in decades must be surely interesting and in case of Nellies brother even wonderful 🙂
So true, Timo. My husband and I worried that Nellie’s brother was too young when he married and that he had too many children too quickly. I’m glad to see that it all worked out for him.
That’s good it all seemed to work have worked out for him, the old patriarch. Right now I am just thinking of people from my youth/ relatives my family might have lost contact with and social media might help out. I am actually rather active with family tree research but ran into many dead ends with my fathers family due to burned records after the war
Good luck on your family tree research. My sister is the one who is doing research for our family.
With all that hand-washing to do . . . a 2nd maid sounds like a “must have.”
I suggested that it wasn’t necessary to iron diapers and underwear, but I guess she didn’t want to be considered lazy.
What an interesting life you had in the Philippines, Nicki. I had an old fashioned mother who insisted on using a wringer washer until the late-sixties when hers broke and she could no longer find a new one to replace it. All laundry was hung on the back yard clothes line, the pulley kind that’s attached to a pole at the far side of the yard. This style is still common in Vancouver, B.C. She finally conceded to buy a clothes dryer because of the damp climate it was difficult to dry things in the winter. When our East Indian neighbors moved in next door and our clothes and bedding began to smell like curry, she started using the dryer all the time! One of the first household jobs she allowed me to do was iron. I pressed all the non-critical things like dish towels and pajamas. Now I rarely pull out the iron.
We had an umbrella clothesline as well as a regular straight one. We had to watch the weather. As soon as it started raining, we’d run out and quickly take everything off the line. Mom also had a big indoor clothes rack. Even on a sunny day, she hung her underwear inside. In the 50s, when stiff slips were in style, my mom would starch our slips and hang them out on the umbrella clothesline using dozens of clothespins. A couple of slips used up most of the clothesline.
I also was enlisted to iron dish towels, cloth handkerchiefs, pillow cases, and such, moving on later to blouses, dresses, and pants. I almost never iron these days. Imagine how big that ironing basket was and how much time we used to spend ironing!
I just hired a housecleaner and am feeling guilty that someone else is doing my work. She’s an immigrant setting up her business so I guess I have no need to worry – she wants the work and the price is fair as far as I know.
Hiring a house cleaner for the first time is a hard thing for us American women. We like to feel we’re capable of doing everything ourselves. Also, we believe in equality. It’s hard to admit that we may have more or less money than someone else, especially when the transaction is so close and personal.
All my life, I’ve always had a washing machine but never a dryer. My parents were adamant no drier because it cost a lot, heated up the house and was not environmentally friendly. We hung our clothes out in the backyard or balcony to dry.
Two maids. I see that now Clarita was there to help out with the clothes, and perhaps other parts of the house and family too like making sure the kids were safe in the water 🙂 You pose very interesting thoughts there. On one hand, having a maid means we become reliant of others to take care of things at home. On the other hand, as you said we give them jobs. In a way, it’s a win-win situation but one you can’t help but think how we can improve our lives – or rather, this world and sometimes that is impossible to change.
You’re right about the environment. Driers use a lot of electricity. We’re so used to them now that it’s hard to go back. I don’t think my mom had one until I was in college. She hung the clothes outside on sunny days and on a clothes rack inside when it rained.
Even though I relied on the maids when we were overseas, when we moved back to the US, it seemed very natural to go back to my more independent ways.
This is a fascinating look at your life, Nicki! It also reminds me of my resolve not to use the self-checkout lanes at department stores. (I don’t want to help the store cut jobs.)
as far as I can remember, we had a washer and dryer when we moved to the house in which I grew up. When I was two and my family lived in an apartment, Mom took us to the laundromat, where she washed our clothes in the big machines there.
I also avoid the self-checkout lanes at the supermarket most of the time. I like to chat with the checkers, especially my favorites.
I can’t remember ever seeing a laundromats in the Philippines, at least in our early days there.
It’s very interesting. Did Clarita have a life outside of your house? Did she have dates or hang with friends?
The maids had days off when they would hang out with friends or visit family. Sometimes they would bring guests over to visit or introduce to us. They had private quarters but let us kids nap there or sing from their books of song lyrics. They would flirt with the gardener and giggle when the Mormon missionaries came around. In the evenings, they would use the house rotary phone to make calls. Sometimes they would cry about their relationships, and come to Daddy for fatherly advice about boys.
I was born in 1942. My brother in 1943; I had two siblings before Mum acquired a washing machine in the 1950s. Her iron was one you heated on the stove. She had a mangle. And Dad was away during the war.
I was born the same year as your brother, Derrick. When my dad was fighting in Europe, my mom and I stayed with my grandparents. My grandma had a wringer-washer. I can’t remember if it was the kind with a hand crank or a motor. My grandma told about a woman who got her long hair caught in the wringer, the kind of home accident one should avoid. I’ve seen the kind of iron that has to be heated on the stove top.
I once mangled my brother Chris’s finger. Fortunately he was small enough for the flattened digit to plump up again
I suppose that was a hand-cranked wringer. One turned by a motor might have flattened more than his finger.
Yes. 🙂