DEARTH OF GOOD MAIDS

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 14, 9 October 1937, Page 15

DEARTH OF GOOD MAIDS

Sabotage In The Home

Tokxo houiewifo to-day is faaisg a gcnuins domestie crisia. In thepait there has been no leriq.us serv*nt problenx in Japan. Maids were ctoeap and abundant, if not always well traiixed, Now, however, circumstances have gmUj changed. Women ara going tata many more branches oi work and ti* faetoxy, with its regular hours oi work and higher money wageg, as attracting many girl* away from domestie Mxvice. Thi* is especially true at the present tUM when soveral hundxed' thousand a#w iadustr utl workers are being taken o a avery years, beoau*e oi the exceptipari a^vity in munitiona production and zaiated industries, Labonr exch&nges report that domea* txe service is oue oi tho few occupations wkere offerings oi plaqes outnumher applicanta for employment. And this i« borni out by the experiences oi a number of Japanese friends of the professional and middle classes. They all report that maids are hard to get and harder to hold, that ' they ieavt §t the first intimation pl sicknesa in the family, or any other development that requires extra work. Oue cause oi the' domestie crisis is the disappearance oi some oid pafriarehal customs without the substitution oi other relatione. t JLn former tizaes household service was in the natnre oi an apprenticeship for marriage. It was considered rather a favouy to agiriif a mistrese wonld take her into service for a year or two, teaching her Japanese honsekeeping and simpltf etiquette. Tbe girl in suck a case roceived a very small money wage, but was rather eensidered as an adopted member of the family, sharing its simple festivals mad outings, receivjng dothing as well as board, and ultimately some handsome presents for the wedding which vi| the normal end of her apprenticeship. Somehow this practice hos gone out of fa?hion, and with it the family loyalty of the old-fashioned Japauese maia. The incomes of the overwhelmmg majority of Japanese are so law that it is impossible, in most cases, to xeplati the attraction of the old-faih-ioned tutelage with the inducement of high wages.,, ' '* As a result the cry goes up in mauy Japanese middle-clas* households that the present-flay maid as capricioua and

unstable; and not a few Japanese middle-clasa homes are permanently or temporarily without servants, The foreign housewife, in Japan has troiibles of her own in the. domestie sphere. Operating, as a rule, on a hud* get less restricted than that of her Jap. anese friends, she can and almost invariably does pay wages well abovo the prevailing scale. But there are psychological obstacles to foreign honsekeeping in Tokio that are beyond the power of gold tp remove, The foreign emplpypr must make hpr choice between two types of servants In Tokio: those who have and those who have not Worked in foreign houses. The'l%tter, ftropg and simple copn|ry giris, if trained, often make the most devoted servants. But the prpccss of traming is a protracteu anct nerve-rack-tng one for mistress and maid alike. For to the Japanese peasant girl a toreign-style h9u.se is a strange piace, full of pitfalls and complication§. She is profuondly ignorant of foreign housekeeping and habits; everything, from the practice of serving women bei'ore men to the care of furniture (which is almost. npn-existent in the Japanese house), aad the use of knives, forks, and spoona is.new aad unacoustomed. UU the other hand, girla who have worked in foreign houses feel themseJves part of a smail class of "specialists," a sort of labour anstocracy, aa.d are apt to be very conseious of their unufva! aecpmplishments and to. depart on slight provocation. Moreover, the tenure of maids of both. these classes is usually likely to be abruptly interrupted by the incidence of matrimony. A trait of the Japanese maid that is also baSiing to the foreign employer is that she spldQm, if ever, gxves the true reason of her deoision to qnit. The official cause is usually a dying grandmother or an ailing father who demands all h.er fllial attention. When one further notes tho deeprootod Oriental tradition as "squeeze'-' as part of the perquisites of the cook it may be reaiised that house-keeping in Tokio, as elsewhere, has its special problems and tribulation'a, The "squeeze" consists of more or less discreefr pudding of the food aocoun.ts, II these irregujar expenditures are checked too closely the cook resorts to subtle" forms of sabotage; the roast beef mysteriously becomes fcough, the vegetables stringly, an.d the pastrycrust soggy.