Things I wish my neighbors would know about their househelps

Maternity leave made an interesting ‘transformation’ in me. The busy, focused, ambitious, time-conscious career woman was reduced to a ‘busy body’ who has seen all the dirty laundry in the estate. Let me explain. In the mid-mornings after I cleaned baby Troy, fed him and burped him, he sleeps like a real baby.

In the name of sprucing up her life, mummy found an interesting way to kill time- standing strategically on the balcony watching the expansive neighborhood for free entertainment.

You see, our neighborhood has so much drama; it is akin to the popular programme on KTN ‘The Real House helps of Kawangware’.

Now there is this house girl who has the habit of finishing her work at record speed, then puts the baby on her back and disappears to some unknown place (I think she goes to the nearby slum to see her boyfriend) for the better part of the day.

I have stood at the balcony for long enough and on significant days to know that she makes her way back to the house just a few hours before her employer is back to pretend that she was in the house tending to two-year-old Muthoni. But why on earth does she go with the poor baby?

I am compelled to report her clandestine activities to her employer, but maybe the woman of the house will ask why I am snooping on her business.

There is also a house girl I have discovered has a stormy relationship with the caretaker. Once the caretaker confirms that the Coast is clear (the lady of the house has driven off), he dashes to that house and spends hours there.

You see, that mama’s kids are in boarding school, so the girl has all the time to enjoy TLC from Muli the caretaker, as housework takes a back seat. That caretaker makes so many random trips back and forth to that house in a day; I only hope whatever they are doing, they are not doing it in the employer’s room. And do you know the funny thing?

That mama believes in that caretaker so much, if I told her something is cooking, I think it is me she would fry for picking my nose in her house.

Now this pastime of mine needs to come to an end like today otherwise, my end is near. The other day, I spotted my neighbor (the respectable Baba Njoro who always leads us in a word of prayer whenever we meet as a plot) teasingly touching an overly excited house girl’s behind after she opened the gate for him. Do I report, do I not? I think this maternity leave needs to come to an end.