The exodus of yayas

In 1966, Oscar Arellano, president of the Operation Brotherhood International, the mother organization of the O.B. Montessori schools watched with fascination my first O.B. Montessori Yaya (Nursemaids) Training Course at the beginning of the school year. I was convinced that it was not enough to orient and train the parents of the O.B. Montessori preschoolers, for most of them would work in offices and leave their children to the yayas.

I initiated the yearly O.B. Montessori Yaya Course. These nursemaids were usually in their teens or early 20’s – mostly from the village. Two-thirds of them were gradeschool dropouts, while the rest had some high school education.

Oscar’s prophetic vision

Oscar would beam happily: “Precious, one day we shall send off planeloads of yayas to work as nannies abroad.”

“What for, Oscar?” I asked, “If that happens, how can our mothers continue to work…”

“Just watch… you cannot stop this exodus. It is inevitable.” He was right. A few years later, several were hired in Hong Kong to work as nannies since there were no more Chinese amahs available. They usually used their O.B. Montessori Yaya Training Certificates as credentials.

Sometimes I don’t blame my school parents, especially those from Makati, when they prefer taking the course themselves since yayas don’t stay long enough. Many househelps are immature, moving from one household to another or suddenly returning to the province without enough notice.

What lessons were taught these yayas? A literacy program using the sophisticated Montessori preschool materials of Math decimal beads, Reading booklets, Botany, Zoology, Geography and History cards. Beforehand, they were first taught Personal Grooming and Hygiene. Good Housekeeping and first aid were also included.

Half of the time, the yayas would work side by side with their wards. It turned out though that the little ones who were more used to the materials and who learned precision more easily would often be critical of their yayas’ careless movements. However, these nursemaids thoroughly enjoyed the enriching experience and would repeat the course the following years.

Mr. Arellano died seven years later, in 1973, when the oil crisis erupted. This economic upheaval devastated the developing countries. However, the Arabs became rich overnight. They hired workers from the so-called “third world.” Then, the real exodus of our housemaids to the Middle East and Europe began.

The first relocation of squatters from Intramuros

Oscar must be smiling down from heaven as he watches us continue the practice of training the preschoolers’ yayas every year not because it led to sending them abroad by planeloads but that it led us to a program that train housewives in the barrios. This started when Oscar exposed me to the Operation Brotherhood projects in relocating slum families in 1963 from Intramuros to Bulacan.

A charming and dazzling persuader, Oscar convinced me to teach the children of the slum families of Intramuros who were relocated to Sapang Palay. I had been teaching in the most popular preschool in Makati, the San Lorenzo Preschool, which was directed by Telly Albert Zulueta for children of multinationals. Here I worked with two Montessori European teachers who trained in Switzerland and London. After four years of joyful teaching these lovely blue-eyed children, I decided I was more challenged to teach the more deprived barrio children.

The Operation Brotherhood team included doctors and nurses, food technologists, agronomists and social workers. While the government health and social work officers came late to work and left before 5 p.m., the O.B. team who lived amidst the relocated families and made themselves available 24 hours a day earned the love and respect of these poor people.

Livelihood program and personal grooming

The parents of our preschoolers were taught livelihood programs like food preservation and personal grooming. I recall the wonderful teacher Oscar hired, a “gay” beautician named Jonas. Twice a week, he would walk gracefully to the O.B. headquarters, fully made-up with a cosmetic case in hand. His English-Tagalog lecture charmed the ladies:

“Girls we must always stay beautiful. One way of doing this is to get a perm. Ngayong araw, tuturuan ko kayo ng pagkulot (Today, I will teach you how to curl your hair) …First, you must part your hair in sections. Tingnan ninyo (Watch me demonstrate).”

Jonas would neatly section the hair of a young village housewife and would let the rest imitate him by dividing themselves into pairs: the “beauticians” and the “models.” I recall that the ladies who varied in age and sizes enthusiastically learned hair cutting and hair perm from Jonas.

Mr. Arellano would proudly show off this beauty parlor session exclaiming: “No rural development will succeed unless you first make the village woman feel she is good-looking. Then watch her speedily respond and cooperate with all other projects…”

Having heard of our outreach literacy program, Italian Ambassador Rubino offered me a borsa di studio or scholarship to train as a Montessori teacher for the three to six years old in the Centro Montessori Internationale in Perugia, Italy. Then, later I did the teacher’s course for the six to 12 years old in Bergamo, Italy.

Why most of the OFWs are women

Between 1984-1988, I would frequent Hacienda Faraon and Hacienda Tamsi in Negros Occidental to help provide the Montessori Pagsasarili Literacy Course in 17 sugar plantations. Our family friend, Punay Kabayao Fernandez assisted me. She and other planters were very troubled by the sudden drop of sugar in the world market. The poor harvest could barely support her farm workers who had always depended on her great grandparents, parents and now her family for their livelihood.

There I saw closely that the typical rural mother generally marry at the early age of 16 to 18 with only an average education of elementary school level. She would bear four to six children almost every year so that at the age of 25 she would look so aged. She knows it is her bitter fate that her wife-mother role would confine her all her life to the barrio. Her husband’s meager income as a fisherman, farmer or laborer would be insufficient specially when the children would get sick or would have to go to school. At this point, her literacy rate would have dropped down to Grade I. If only she can be re-educated and given the skills and discipline to put up a backyard business to supplement the family income.

The Faraon experience helped me put together the literacy manual with the help of Punay’s daughter, Tamsi. With UNESCO funding, it resulted in a fine illustrated manual in English and Tagalog that could be called a “recipe book” on Personal Grooming and Hygiene, Good Housekeeping, Maternal and Child Care, Cooking and Nutrition – for village mothers.

Restructuring the village house

The single-room “bahay kubo” is associated with poverty. Its simplistic architecture consisting of just one room that is a living-dining room during the day and a bedroom at night with a kitchen, toilet and bath outside conditions the family to live poorly.

To change the outlook of the yayas that they are poor, we constructed a huge bahay kubo (nipa hut) for functional literacy at the OB Montessori Greenhills headquarters. Real bamboo craftsmen made it authentic. The house provides a large living-dining room surrounded by waist-high cabinets complete with cooking utensils, dining set, house lines, and personal grooming kits. Two bedrooms side by side for parents and children allow adequate privacy. The kitchen and laundry areas are behind with the Japanese “squat-type” toilet and bathrooms close by.

For 12 years, we have used the Mothercraft house for our yaya training. Two years ago, this was upgraded – the living/dining room flooring was changed to granite tiles and the nipa roof with tile span roofing material.

This experience has provided the yayas a very pleasant feeling that they could live with full dignity and acquire self-esteem with a different home environment which would set an example for their neighbors.  

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