Category Archives: My Thoughts

I have a slave

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Well, that’s what Hannah calls it. In reality, it’s an employee whose job it is to cook, clean and do the laundry, her name is Mariam.

Over here in Kenya, most people have some form of house help. When you have a baby you hire an ayah, someone to take care of your child. They usually live in your house and may or may not have their own child.

Some people have more than one employee in their care. They may have a gardener, a child minder, a cook and a cleaner. They may even have a driver or someone to do all the errands and pay the bills.

Our home help comes with the house we are renting from friends. Normally we wouldn’t bother, but we also want to keep her employed until they return from overseas.

I must admit it’s really convenient. I do a meal plan for the week (Monday to Friday), get the groceries and let her know if there’s anything special to be done. Because I work around 60 – 70 hours a week it’s nice to know that I don’t have to squeeze in making dinner or doing the laundry. We even get our clothes ironed, which Pete thinks is fantastic as he has to do his own ironing in the past.

Every day I come home and it’s both clean and tidy. Straight after dinner I am usually tutoring a young man so it’s not like I can have a relaxing evening in front of the TV. We simply rinse the dishes and leave them for Mariam for the morning.

In a few months we move out to our own place. Pete asked me today if I would consider getting a person in to do a few hours a day. I’d love to say yes, but to find someone for 3 hours is just about impossible. Here’s hoping it becomes a possibility!

Slavery was outlawed centuries ago, but in many countries it still happens. All employees should be paid fairly, treated well and given an opportunity to prove themselves.

Our home help is so great to have around not just because of the work we do, but her cheerful nature that she brings into the house each day. Some people have difficulty finding ideal staff, so we are super lucky indeed.

I’m glad we can help someone keep their kids in school and a roof over their head. We win, they win.

Despite what my youngest child thinks, we don’t have a slave, we have a short term member of the Crean Team. While it takes a whole village to raise a child, it takes a whole team to keep the Wild Creanberries alive and well.

I Don’t Support Piracy

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Over here in Kenya you can buy very few legitimate DVD’s and CD’s. For Christmas we bought our daughter a CD and they physically showed us that it was a new one and that it wasn’t just burned off a computer. When we put it in the first time, iTunes wouldn’t recognise it and said it was empty. ‘What a waste of $6’ I thought. The second time it worked but wouldn’t bring up the artist of song name. That was bought was a real music store.

Anywhere on the side of a road there will be people selling all sorts of things from kites, to DVD’s to fruit. When Skyfall came out at the movies within a couple of days the DVD also came out by a very friendly salesman not far from home.

For most people, they think nothing of spending $6 on a pirated DVD or illegally downloading something off the internet. To them it seems okay to photocopy whole books for their schooling. We had two overseas students living with us for 2 years in Sydney and they saw nothing wrong with spending $10 at a shop downtown photocopying an entire book. Neither did they mind copying and pasting stuff off the internet without giving reference to the author. In one assignment I saw that they hadn’t even bothered to change the font from the source to what was in their assignment!

I don’t support piracy because it’s stealing, just wrapped up nicely. One could say that it’s keeping people employed. Do we then buy drugs because it keeps people employed?

Stealing is stealing. I’ve told my girls off several times for illegally downloading things via sources like Torrent. You can justify it as much as you like but it’s still taking something and not paying for it.

I tell you who pays for it. It’s the artists, musicians, writers and actors who have put their time, effort and skills into creating something we love to watch or read. I was watching the making of Inception (on a genuine DVD) and the writer took 8 years to create the story. Eight years of developing and sacrificing to bring forth a story that entertains millions, only to have it sold illegally for a couple of dollars.

It’s also the buyer that pays for it. Why do you think they cost so much?

As a Christian, I refuse to buy illegally made software, DVD’s, CD’s etc no matter how ‘real’ they appear. It’s against the rules people!

I have plenty of musician friends who I am proud to support by paying for their songs. As a photographer nothing grates you more than when people use your photos without permission, and don’t give credit for the source. Sure Instagram has given a lot to the photography world but it doesn’t make you an artist.

While lots of people say there are no copyright rules in Africa, that’s simply untrue. Everyone complains about corruption but here it is on the ground level. If we continue to support piracy we have no right to complain about officials who are doing the same thing but in a different form.

Pay the price and keep your conscience clean. Support our artists and show people we don’t have to scoop to illegal acts just to get what we want.