Dreams of making pupusas

Maritza, 42, emigrated from El Salvador 14 years ago when her oldest daughter was 6. Her younger daughter, 10, translates for us during this interview. Maritza's job does not require much English because her patrona is Spanish from Argentina. The two girls she watches, ages 5 and 2, also speak Spanish. Cleaning the house and washing clothes are not required, only taking care of the children three days a week for six hours a day. "I do light cleaning but it's not my obligation, I do it from the heart."

When asked what she likes most about her job, Maritza answers, "Everything. I like the children, I like not cleaning. I adore the children."

Annthro: What do you like to buy, spend your money on?
Maritza: Comer (food!)

Her sister also babysits in Manhattan Beach, so they meet for lunch at the farmer's market and dine on pupusas with their client children. Maritza is known for her former informal job selling pupusas in a neighborhood store.

Annthro: What are your longterm goals?
Maritza: I want to make my own business making pupusas, no more children. There will be no time to care for them.

Cleaning, waiting, Juanita

Juanita came from Jalisco, Mexico and has been waiting for her papers to be approved for 12 years. Her employers try to help her through their connections. She is 33 and holds a university degree. "Here I study English. I'm trying to get my education recognized from Mexico. I got a degree in Graphic design, and I finished, but I can't do anything here. I need to start all over again--They told me I need to finish my GED. I started working, got married, had a baby, I quit. For now, it's hard."

With all her advantages, she faced the same obstacles as less educated immigrants. "I didn't have work, I didn't have papers, couldn't find anything, and I couldn't speak English. I started caring for kids in my house."

Juanita babysits two small children three days a week for $12/hr. "If it's for children only it should be $12 an hour. For cleaning also, it should be more. I clean the house, Monday, and the next day, and the next day, and the next day, almost every day I clean the house."

What she likes least about this job is the cleaning. Says Juanita, "I can't take care of the kids and clean. I try to clean when the child is with me. I can't! Sometimes they [employers] don't appreciate what we do. They just say, 'I'm paying her, she can do whatever I want.' They don't see that it's too hard for me. I was working when I got pregnant. And I was cleaning too. I stopped working two weeks before I gave birth. So it's hard work. There are a lot of people like me. They work when they're pregnant and they just keep going..."

Juanita is another who quietly endures the indignity of no food provided. "Sometimes in the house there are not good foods for us to eat and it's not fair. We are with the kids and [employer] hasn't bought anything for us to eat. We don't eat the same foods as kids." This seems like a blindspot for employer mothers. Nannies have dietary needs more like their own and less like the high-fat high-cholesterol mac and cheese preferred by children.

Carria is the beginning and the end

I met Carria when I began to explore the nannies' labor network in the nearby children's playground. This became a pilot study for the thesis I'm writing now. Carria had faltering English since she had been here only a year, but she was young and didn't seem to know many people. She was taking English at a nearby adult school and since she was willing to talk, I interviewed her. Carria had a live-in job watching the 4-month old son of a single working mother. She was the last of ten El Salvadoran brothers and sisters to join their mother here in LA. Her sister had a job waiting for her when she came, which demonstrates the family network as a means of procuring jobs. Carria brought the baby to the park twice a week. She was hungry for social interaction with anyone, adults or children. I interviewed her again 16 months later. The boy was 20 months old. They visited the park every day. Her English had greatly improved, she had moved out and now lived in her own apartment, drove to work, and planned to ask for a raise in a year. This job paid $11/hr. She worked four jobs to afford her rent. She loved her job and the little boy. The next time we met she told me her employer gave her two weeks to find a new job because the boy would enter preschool. Carria was shocked and hopeful. The employer promised to help her make ends meet. This never happened, but a few months later she had found two partime jobs. Carria was now very disillusioned. For example, a potential employer wanted childcare for 3 kids plus lots of cleaning for only $12/hr. I happened to interview a different nanny who was troubled by the set-up with her own employer. Sometimes the mother would hide under the bed so she wouldn't have to be with her own children, or ask the nanny to say she wasn't home. When this nanny left at the end of the day, another would come take over for the evening shift. Another came on weekends, and this mother did not hold a job. The night shift nanny was Carria. I felt my study had come full circle.