Name: Grace Lim
Millennia Institute
Pre-University, Year One (Business)
What are heroes? You don’t have to look far as they are all around, often portrayed as fictional life saving characters willing to endanger their lives just to save others.
But are all of them the same?
When someone is just there for you and is constantly offering support, does that count?
“Hey! Bring me a glass of water!”
“Yes, Mum”, she answered and hurried back to the kitchen.
Esther has been my family’s maid for the past five years. At the age of twenty four, she had to leave her family and come to Singapore to earn a living. How would you feel if you had to leave whatever you have behind just to earn your keep? This is what some of the domestic helpers here have to put up with just for the measly sum of three to four hundred dollars a month.
I was only twelve then. I always knew her as a nice auntie who came to work for us and clean the house. What I did not know was the troubles she had to go though even before she could manage to set foot in Singapore.
Her husband died in a car crash, leaving behind two young children and an aged and sickly father. Her Father in law was saddled with a long term disease that required a lot of money for the lengthy medical expenses. Without any income, Esther had to leave them behind in search of alternative ways of earning an income.
One evening, without any warning, she came to me and overwhelmed with emotions she told me her story. I do not know what prompted her action and what I could offer her was just a listening ear. To my surprise, I found myself crying upon hearing the pitiful story. I wasn’t expecting such kind of emotions to overcome me, as I didn’t usually communicate with my maids except for the usual “glass of water please.” Or “what’s for dinner?”
I could really understand what she has gone though and how she has sacrificed herself for the sake of family. Her story really touched me and prompted me not to take the little things in my life for granted and made me pay more attention to the people around me.
As in my story, my made become my heroine and her determination made me appreciate my life better.
As the morning sun is a gift to the blind and music is a gift to the deaf, my maid helped me look at things into a bigger perspective.
She might not be as glamorous as the heroes portrayed by fictional books but her willingness to self sacrifice has spoken to me and moved me in a way than no one else could.
To me Esther is a hero, no matter what others might think.