The Help

Couple of weeks ago I read Kathryn Stockett's 'The Help' and watched the movie soon after.  Quite the hype the movie's gotten, so I had to wait in line couple of weeks before I was able to loan the book from the library.  Seeing how long the wait was I checked the closest bookstore which was 'out'.

It was an easy read once you get the hang of the slang-ish dialect Stockett uses for one of the maids.  Very interesting book about the 60s colored help in the US, the southern states to be specific, and the white families they work for.  Movie was alright too, but quite a bit of the book was condensed to make the movie for a two and a half hours (almost as long as a Hindi movie - sheesh!).  Didn't feel it was that long mind you I got enough grunts and grumbles from the partner in crime for not informing the movie is this long before agreeing to see it.

I'm not sure how different it is in Sri Lanka (where I grew up) when it comes to domestic help.  Even now. Many of us, including my family, had help growing up.  Either in the form of baby sitter/nanny, kitchen help, house cleaner, gardener, or a combination of all.  I'm sure many of us treated our maids like family, with the exception of a few.  But they often had a washroom made for them outside or at the back of the house, even the apartment complexes that's being built smack in the middle of colombo has separate maid's bedroom and washroom.

This was definitely true during the 90s and the early 2000's and to this date perhaps?

where do we stand.. or is it just job creation in countries like ours (edit: Sri Lanka).