WHERE IS TA-TAAK (Kakak)?

14 May 2008, Wednesday

After completing her obligatory 2 years with us, our Indonesian maid decided to go home to her family. I must admit that having her around, we have had more time to ourselves and never needed to worry about the household chores and dinner meals.

Her initial thought was to stay but she changed her mind in the end, citing family health and her growing son. Timing couldn’t have been more perfect as it was less than 2 months to her departure and we had to quickly scout for her replacement. We did not managed to find one until mid April and now we are faced with a situation of being without a maid for at least another 6-8 weeks. Bummer…

Anyhow, back to the objective of this entry. We were initially concern about how Aiden was going to take to her departure. He had grown quite attached to her, not surprising, as she spends the most time with him; and of late I noticed that he will call out for her if she is not in sight - "Ta-taaak, Ta-taak".

Yesterday, she left us to the agent's office. Aiden went round the house looking for her, going into her room calling for her. He came out looking forlorn and shook his head whilst twisting his wrists indicating that she could not be found. We explained to him time and time again that she has gone home, but I don’t think my little one understood me. In the end, I gave up and just said that she has gone out.

Back to reality, I now need to spend an additional hour after work to clean the house, and wake up an additional half hour earlier to prepare Aiden's food and bottles, before getting to work. Not to forget cleaning up the kitchen mess only after Aiden's gone to bed. We will certainly miss the convenience of having her around and waking up to breakfast, mopped floors and laundry out hanging to dry. I just hope I'm this lucky again with the new maid.