“I wish I could easily hire house help just like we do in India.”
“It’s so hard to balance house work and office here.”
“No matter what position I hold at work, I still have to come home every day to a sink full of dishes, cooking and cleaning.”
Sounds familiar?
Well, this is a story of most first-generation Indian migrants in western countries. Having grown up with multiple sources of help in India, they often struggle to manage both home and work front in say Australia, where having house help is still a luxury.
Look back at India and the ratio is inversely proportional because India has a large pool of low-income workers who will easily take up jobs of cook, cleaner, gardener, driver or nanny. Diasporic communities don’t have the same availability of affordable labour, making domestic help less accessible for most people.
A typical weekend for me while I lived in Sydney used to be – grocery shopping, a few rounds of laundry, cleaning the house, cooking, and prepping meals for the coming week. Now imagine, you’ve spent your Sunday doing this and then you get on a video call with your cousin in India who’s chilling on her couch while instructing her maid to deep clean under the couch, while she waits for the cook to come cook tonight’s dinner. The grass certainly looks greener on that side of the fence, doesn’t it?
After years of juggling the demands of both home and work, navigating the endless debates over who does what, and 11,760 arguments later, you reach a point where you just want to keep up with the joneses. You tell yourself, “I can have it all – the help, the convenience, the luxury. All I need to do is move back to India.”
This was not a consideration for me personally when I returned to India, but there are people I know who’ve moved solely for that reason. And, honestly, after three years of having help with everything from cooking to cleaning, folding laundry, and even gardening, I can see why they might. But here’s the thing – I would still prefer the way things were in Sydney, and I’d go back to that lifestyle in a heartbeat if I could. Let me explain why.
Having house help is a double-edged sword. Firstly, finding reliable house help is a real challenge. Second, even when you finally find someone suitable, it takes a while to see if they meet your expectations. More often than not, they don’t, leading to a constant cycle of trial and replacement. Your helper might promise to take only two days off a month, but you end up giving them more – and without pay cuts, mind you, because the aunty next-door aunty has approved all their leave, and hasn’t argued over pay cuts, so you can’t either! See, you risk being talked about not only in their circles, but in society circles too. And they will make sure their friends and family don’t work at your place in future. Eventually, you settle for 20-25 days of help, realising it’s better than none. Meanwhile, your helper knows you’re dependent on them, and they take advantage of it, knowing you won’t go through the hassle of finding someone better. So, you end up putting up with the situation because of all the time and effort you’ve already invested.
The third challenge is the constant unpredictability of house help. They may or may not show up on time, often with new excuses for being late or absent, and you’re expected to be understanding—even if it’s their seventh day off this month. Having help also means someone is house-sitting all day, which can be tricky. I often need to step out, so I have to tightly manage schedules for cooking, cleaning, dishwashing, ironing, and daily deliveries. If I were working in an office, I feel I’d need to add a house-sitter to my army of helpers to ensure the availability of all services.
And lastly, my least favourite part of having house help – complete intrusion to my privacy. It’s unsettling knowing that our private conversations, discussions on finance, and future plans are often overheard, leaving us feeling restricted in our own home. We end up avoiding topics which impact our comfort and relationships.
So why do I have house help at all?
Well, the environment plays a major role here. The hot and polluted conditions make it necessary to change clothes multiple times a day, creating mountains of laundry and ironing. Daily house cleaning is a must, as dust settles everywhere and cooking three fresh meals a day adds to the workload with more time in the kitchen and more dishes to clean. My city doesn’t have decent, well-regulated daycare options, so if both parents want to work here, a nanny becomes a necessity. Labour is also far more affordable than it is in Australia, and so domestic help like drivers, gardeners, dog walkers are common.
Managing and training help, dealing with their unpredictability and the constant turnover adds to the stress, but it’s a price we pay to keep things running along smoothly.
Having experienced the freedom and privacy that comes with being independent (like I was when I lived in Sydney) and knowing the comfort and ease that house helps provide (in my current life in Ahmedabad), I would choose the former option any day – I prefer my privacy, taking charge of my own household affairs and routines, and manage everything on my terms!
