Looking for a New Cleaning Lady

[onionsoupmix]

In this here article, some dude named Bentzion Elisha from Crown Heights tells us his very sad and woeful tale of how the Evil Spanish-Speaking Cleaning Lady robbed his family of their precious jewelry. Their items were returned to them, but it was still quite traumatic for the poor dears.

After the heart-wrenching story, Bentzion asks his readers

Comments

[happyduck1979]

Sorry, but this time I disagree with you. There are some people who really do need cleaning help. I know I go months without it, but, for example, this is one of my busiest times of year and I would not get through my pessach cleaning without help.

While I see you point about clean your own mess (and for them most part we do), there is something to be said for hiring someone and if you do you need to know something about who you are hiring! I would certainly not pain an entire community with one brush and say no Spanish cleaning help- but then again I do. I would never allow an Aravi woman to be alone in my home. Truthfully, the help I do hire is people from within my own community.

If we, as a community, stopped looking down on people who earn an honest living by doing manual labour, perhaps there would be more places where we could openly hire people we know and trust

[onionsoupmix]

First of all, the family in the article does not have cleaning help just for Pesach.

Second of all, even for Pesach, I have found, it is not that difficult to clean your own house. If I can manage to do it, most people can, those with physical disabilities excepted.

In times of great need, I have hired people for Pesach before and sitting and scrubbing alongside with them makes you that much less likely to "look down on people who earn an honest living by doing manual labor."

As for "I would never allow an Aravi woman to be alone in my home," that is no better than "I would never allow that Jew alone with my money." It's not worth living in Israel if you have to be so bigoted to get through the day.

[ruchel]

Unfortunately, in Israel and even in chul, you have to be wary not necessarily of your Arab cleaning lady, but of her crazy fanatic bro/nephew/son... some can and do go as far as blowing up the "traitor, white people submitted" relative with the aforementioned "white people".

[happyduck1979]

sure it is. I am sorry you do not think so but thankfully I make my own decisions. The truth of the matter, my hesitation is new to once we made aliya- in fact it is even more recent since there have been a number of local attacks recently. None of them perpetrated by Israeli's. That being said, I use students to clean for me, and I do not work along side them. We put money aside to budget for this and do without things that many other's consider normal. Why would I let someone else tell me how to spend my money? I do not have a car. Pay very little tuition. Do very little shopping- so this is a treat to myself to make my pre-pessach easier (easier while I work 18 hour days).

Citation:

[barilanisher]

"the lady put the baby by the oven and turned the gas on without turning on the fire until the baby fell asleep, aided by the gas fumes!"

I am wondering what kind of gas this family have at their kitchen? Laughing gas (N2O)? As far as I know, domestic cooking gas (methane, butane or mixture)is NOT anesthetic! You can put baby "to sleep" with domestic gas is possible only by putting him into coma! If this terrible story would be true, no way the baby would survive this procedure repeated several times.

My example just to show how many dirty, low-level lies Lubavichers use to fulfill their mission: to teach to hate "goim"

Re: Citation:

[sethg_prime]

Also, I call BS on this: Smiling she said to them “You know, whenever I cooked for you I always added a special ingredient with a special flavor, pork, that’s why you liked my cooking so much!”

Re: Citation:

[barilanisher]

The family with the gas was in Williamsburg and therefore almost certainly not Lubavitchers.

But this is just to so how many dirty, low-level lies certain people use to fulfill their mission: to teach hate of Lubavitchers

Re: Citation:

[onionsoupmix]

The story is told by a lubavitcher. And we are questioning the veracity of the story. Most likely, it did not happen, not in Willy, not in CH, not in Boro Park.

But perhaps you will be pleased to know that I had a short stint in seminary, working in Willy with handicapped children. This came to a quick end when the woman of the house accused me of stealing change and worshipping idols, namely the Rebbe.

The article and readers' responds

[barilanisher]

are really "cool". I believe that if some Christian website in some country would publish same story and same responds about Jews like this article do against Poles and Latinos (comparing them to dogs, accusing all of them in stealing, in gassing/poisoning of children etc) Israel would return ambassador from this country. But as known, to ultra-orthodox permitted everything.

Re: The article and readers' responds

[onionsoupmix]

I don't think cleaning ladies have an ambassador, but yeah the comments were pretty outrageous.

Re: The article and readers' responds

[barilanisher]

I just wanted to say that many Frum cites permit themselves extreme xenophobic statement. Would common christian website use same statements against Jews, it will immediately result in big scandal involving ADL, Israeli Representatives etc. I don't want H"V to see anti-Jewish statements in christian websites, but as a minority that sometimes seek for protection from xenophobia, I don't think that it's a good idea to show to everybody, in English language and acceptable to every man, how some of our own gyes full of hate to others. I'm not talking about chabad-messianic web-resuorces, these gyes lost their mind long time ago, but Yeshiva World was till recently respectable website

Re: The article and readers' responds

[onionsoupmix]

I know, I understood your comment, I think the ambassador part was just funny :)

[livelife73]

let's remember YOU are part of YOUR community, so it isn't ALL bad

[mrn613]

Hmmmm in the good old days, people had MORE help than they do today, not less help. Before WWII, there were many young girls who had no other source of income besides cleaning. And many older women, widows and divorcees, who had no other source of income besides taking in laundry or cooking. some of these women didn't receive any salary besides room and board or a fraction of the food they would cook for other people.

Plus, the homes in which your grandparents lived was probably filthy and their clothes stank. In the good old days before vacuums, you only shook out your carpets once per year. And you had two sets of clothes, one of which was wool and couldn't be washed even if you wanted it washed.

Cleaning lady or no cleaning lady, I'm not going back to good old days, thank you very much.

[livelife73]

I didn't call them the good old days. I wouldn't go back there either, but more for reasons of sexism, anti-semitism, racism, homophobia, etc

[conundrum1]

My great-grandparents also settled in the Praries! They lived in rural Alberta.

None of my relatives had cleaning help, whether in Canada, Israel or Eastern Europe. Who had money for that? They were more focussed on the essentials, like food and shelter.

I somehow doubt that my grandparents' homes stank. It may not have had the pleasant smell of chemicals, but there are natural cleaning solutions (baking soda, vinegar, water and soap....).

[tesyaa]

1) Has Bentzion's wife weighed in? It's easy for a man to worry about the cleaning lady's morals

[sethg_prime]

The Chabad lady continued to employ her despite my warnings, and a year later the cleaning lady stole from her. But my neighbor CONTINUES to employ her because she does such a good cleaning job!!

See, that’s not theft.

That’s unilateral salary renegotiation.

Why doesn't steal...

[barilanisher]

Why of us never steal pens from work, never used office fax/mail/printer/copy machine/internet for private needs? Normal boss never punish his employees for such small violations; so why to cleaning ladies should be forbidden to steal old plastic earnings of you daughter cost 5$? Be a mantch ant treat people like you want be treated.

Re: Why doesn't steal...

[sethg_prime]

http://www.amazon.com/Build-Better-Stealing-Office-Supplies/dp/1857880153