Of Me, my Dear Husband(DH) our Maid and Cook....

To continue with the story of trying to manage a maid and a cook....

After weeks of getting up in the morning and sweetening our morning cup of coffee with squabbles over what instructions to give the maid and cook on that particular day and which of us would do it, I had had enough and came to a decision; to split "them two" between "us two".

I bagged the cook and gave DH the maid as in our former lives I used to be master chef and DH the sous chef and he was the janitorial supervisor, me the imbecile cleaner ( which basically meant that I was too stupid to do the bathrooms etc so he got to do all the heavy duty stuff...hehe!)

Today happened to be the first day we could put this into practice as DH happened to be at home( he is usually out of town, either for a day or for days together on business) BUT when I woke up this morning he had just gotten back from his early morning yoga class thoroughly thrilled with the weather and sighting my daily plumpening (is there such a word? If not, there should be, coz there's no better way to describe me...)he "encouraged" me to go for a nice long walk and offered to pass on my instructions to the cook AND promised to remember everything I had pointed out around the house to him so he could instruct the maid.

I went for my nice long walk and stayed out for about an hour soaking up some sun before it got to be burning hot and then went back home to find...

...my DH busily typing away at his laptop.

Cobwebs continued to lurk in both dark and bright corners while the maid was apparently on the point of finishing up her day's work...the toilets did not look like it had been cleaned...on questioning DH, he asks me, "doesn't she clean it everyday?" (????)...on questioning the maid, she explains that she cleaned it with plain water (?????)...

Went to the kitchen to inquire after my dish of thinly sliced and sauteed raw bananas only to see that the thin slices seems to have transformed to big fat cubes...so I ask DH, "did you forget to give her my instructions?" and he goes..."No! I told her that the bananas have to be "thinly sliced", hasn't she sliced it?"...ok who do I yell at? DH for assuming that a woman who struggles to articulate basic numbers in English would understand the term "thinly sliced"? Or my cook for assuming to understand when she hasn't understood his instructions?

Well...I didn't yell at anybody...after all it was a nice morning and I had just come in from a nice long walk...and also DH excused himself on the score that he was preoccupied with his work...yeah yeah...

Fast forward to our luncheon conversation...DH is telling me how my cook's alcoholic husband has ruined her life...the cook told him her story this morning and apparently the maid too added her two cents to abuse the cook's husband...ok! whew! The two women hardly ever shoot the wind with me despite me being at home all the time, while DH sprints in and out of the house like a freakin olympic athlete and the day they get him alone they gossip and all my instructions are gone with wind....

Jeez...whenever will I acquire the skills required to manage my servants and teach it to DH? Coz, you can't simply give orders to Indian maids or you will speedily find yourself without household help. You've got to learn the value of well placed smiles with your regular requests, special smiles for special requests, playfulness while delivering corrections and criticisms, the ability to turn a blind eye towards certain negligent behaviors while wholeheartedly appreciating positive behaviors, just the right mixture of coaxing and command while instructing, not being too uptight about (for them immaterial) things like punctuality and keeping you informed in advance about a change in their plans....the list goes on so I will stop here...

The day I master all this, I'll apply for a position as a foreign ambassador and have myself sent to our favorite neighboring country...eh?