RM 200.00
Finally, my august salary landed with a bump in my account. A week has passed since the date they promise. What took them so long, nobody knows. Finally I can stop peeking into my wallet and counting the bills inside before chooses a meal.
Miss those years in school when you don’t have to care how much money you have in your wallet and the only thing you care is how to tackle your parents to give you extra allowances.
Even back in University, I don’t really experience shortage of money (nak kata diri tu murah rezekilah – toya!) but now, it’s very hard to keep a straight face when you know for the fact that you only have RM 2 in your wallet. Just enough for toll.
Sad but it’s is true.
It all started when I was working with my uncle. Payment was like RM 10 per day. Business wasn’t good and there were times I don’t even get paid for that day. So, I give up the job and now working with a new employer.
Here, they pay me RM 800.00 per month. Few friends tell me that I can’t be making a living with RM 800 per month. This is Penang, though it is not KL yet the life expense is almost the same. What inspire me the most is the fact that a cleaner lady here is making RM 200.00 per month (I don’t know whether she has some other jobs). How can one live with RM 200 and I can’t be living with RM 800?
This cleaner lady must have some responsibility towards others (kids, siblings, mother) and to herself as well. Can the RM 200 be enough? Actually how enough is enough?
A bit bout cleaner lady
This cleaner lady of ours (The Actors Studio Greenhall), I call her Auntie Ju-On (based on a Japanese horror flick with the same name) because of a Ju-On like accident we encounter few months ago. This lady is so frail that the first time I saw her I can’t keep wondering how she manage to do all the work. She came with her bike every Thursday and Saturday for cleaning works. She’s suppose to come on Tuesday as well but she didn’t. don’t know why since she can’t converse either in Malay or English and I can’t speak Hokkien. So any direction I should give and she should understand is given and taken by mutual understanding (nodding, sign language, body language – theater experience does work here). Her bike, an old red Raleigh will be park in front of the theater and locked with an oily old bike lock (the one you use back in Sekolah Rendah). She’ll come in and do her work for about 3 or 4 hours and then she go back. In order to tell me that she’s going back, she’ll said ‘bye!’ and showed me the door. Funny hah!
That’s our cleaner lady. She earned RM 200 a month. She worked hard for herself and her family. Little I know about her. Still she survives didn’t she? Why can’t I with RM 800.
Finally, my august salary landed with a bump in my account. A week has passed since the date they promise. What took them so long, nobody knows. Finally I can stop peeking into my wallet and counting the bills inside before chooses a meal.
Miss those years in school when you don’t have to care how much money you have in your wallet and the only thing you care is how to tackle your parents to give you extra allowances.
Even back in University, I don’t really experience shortage of money (nak kata diri tu murah rezekilah – toya!) but now, it’s very hard to keep a straight face when you know for the fact that you only have RM 2 in your wallet. Just enough for toll.
Sad but it’s is true.
It all started when I was working with my uncle. Payment was like RM 10 per day. Business wasn’t good and there were times I don’t even get paid for that day. So, I give up the job and now working with a new employer.
Here, they pay me RM 800.00 per month. Few friends tell me that I can’t be making a living with RM 800 per month. This is Penang, though it is not KL yet the life expense is almost the same. What inspire me the most is the fact that a cleaner lady here is making RM 200.00 per month (I don’t know whether she has some other jobs). How can one live with RM 200 and I can’t be living with RM 800?
This cleaner lady must have some responsibility towards others (kids, siblings, mother) and to herself as well. Can the RM 200 be enough? Actually how enough is enough?
A bit bout cleaner lady
This cleaner lady of ours (The Actors Studio Greenhall), I call her Auntie Ju-On (based on a Japanese horror flick with the same name) because of a Ju-On like accident we encounter few months ago. This lady is so frail that the first time I saw her I can’t keep wondering how she manage to do all the work. She came with her bike every Thursday and Saturday for cleaning works. She’s suppose to come on Tuesday as well but she didn’t. don’t know why since she can’t converse either in Malay or English and I can’t speak Hokkien. So any direction I should give and she should understand is given and taken by mutual understanding (nodding, sign language, body language – theater experience does work here). Her bike, an old red Raleigh will be park in front of the theater and locked with an oily old bike lock (the one you use back in Sekolah Rendah). She’ll come in and do her work for about 3 or 4 hours and then she go back. In order to tell me that she’s going back, she’ll said ‘bye!’ and showed me the door. Funny hah!
That’s our cleaner lady. She earned RM 200 a month. She worked hard for herself and her family. Little I know about her. Still she survives didn’t she? Why can’t I with RM 800.
2 comments:
cuz she doesn't spend on petrol, she doesnt eat like you do, she doesn't live in a home full of electrical stuff... etc..
how old is she btw?
mmmmm.... tengok gaya late 40s la
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