What's your strangest experience as a nanny?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was au-pair in Germany and had a fantastic time with a wonderful family. The experience was so great that I decided to do another year in France and started looking. I had been emailing with a mother who seemed nice and easy-going and we were almost going to set up a phone interview when she sent me a list of the chores she'd like me to do. Now, au-pair rules in Germany and France are much more along the lines of cultural exchange and not slavery as they are in America, so an au-pair is supposed to work 20 hours a week, no heavy cleaning or cooking for the whole family, allowing time for language classes, at least one full weekend day free and a small stipend. This mother sent me a list of chores that was literally two Word pages long, including cleaning their pool, brushing several of their dogs, cooking dinners for the whole family, spring cleaning, keeping the garage tidy and a myriad other ridiculous things that had nothing to do with childcare. She kindly said she would do a schedule for me so that I could accomplish these tasks throughout the week in the mornings while the kids were in daycare and this way they wouldn't seem daunting. Considering I was to have the kids each day for 5 hours after daycare, I'm not sure it wouldn't worked out to 20 hours a week. She also said her current au-pair was feeling homesick and wanted to go home early... I'm guessing her current au-pair realised she wasn't going to learn any French and was spending the entire time polishing silver.

My then hostmother effectively forbade me going to that family (not that I was going to go myself) and then sent that French mother an email saying how she's not respecting the principles of au-pairing and giving the program a bad name and all that, and I have rarely loved my hostmother more - and I love her lots.

I participated in the au-pair program years ago and have lived and worked around Europe now, literally my only negative experience ever (regarding childcare) is with French mothers. It's quite off. I had a family that was an Austrian dad and French mom, the kids were amazing (worldly, polite, outgoing, kind, considerate), the dad was just amazing and helpful and friendly, but somehow the mom, surrounded by all these wonderful people was still a bitter, rude, passive-aggressive woman. Since then my rule has always been to never work for a family with a French parent.

I worked as an AP I Spain and had a horrible experience. I was with 2 toddlers from 7am-9pm. I was expected to cook and clean the entire house. I did everything from getting the kids up in the morning to putting them to bed.

There we NO protections even though I was supposed to only be working 20hrs a week. It does not suprise me that someone would have a positive experience as an AP in Germany which is a culture whoare rule folowers. Many of my fellow AP friends in Spain had a similarly abusive experience. Plus we got paid less than US APS considerably less.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was au-pair in Germany and had a fantastic time with a wonderful family. The experience was so great that I decided to do another year in France and started looking. I had been emailing with a mother who seemed nice and easy-going and we were almost going to set up a phone interview when she sent me a list of the chores she'd like me to do. Now, au-pair rules in Germany and France are much more along the lines of cultural exchange and not slavery as they are in America, so an au-pair is supposed to work 20 hours a week, no heavy cleaning or cooking for the whole family, allowing time for language classes, at least one full weekend day free and a small stipend. This mother sent me a list of chores that was literally two Word pages long, including cleaning their pool, brushing several of their dogs, cooking dinners for the whole family, spring cleaning, keeping the garage tidy and a myriad other ridiculous things that had nothing to do with childcare. She kindly said she would do a schedule for me so that I could accomplish these tasks throughout the week in the mornings while the kids were in daycare and this way they wouldn't seem daunting. Considering I was to have the kids each day for 5 hours after daycare, I'm not sure it wouldn't worked out to 20 hours a week. She also said her current au-pair was feeling homesick and wanted to go home early... I'm guessing her current au-pair realised she wasn't going to learn any French and was spending the entire time polishing silver.

My then hostmother effectively forbade me going to that family (not that I was going to go myself) and then sent that French mother an email saying how she's not respecting the principles of au-pairing and giving the program a bad name and all that, and I have rarely loved my hostmother more - and I love her lots.

You're right. Working 30 hrs/wk for $300/month, and having to pay for my own French language courses + airfare + insurance, and have one day off a week to explore is a lot less like slave labor than working 45 hrs/wk for $195.75/week with 1.5 day off each week, plus having my airfare, insurance, and courses paid for, as well as having cultural outings included in my first week here, and then monthly for the remainder of the year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was au-pair in Germany and had a fantastic time with a wonderful family. The experience was so great that I decided to do another year in France and started looking. I had been emailing with a mother who seemed nice and easy-going and we were almost going to set up a phone interview when she sent me a list of the chores she'd like me to do. Now, au-pair rules in Germany and France are much more along the lines of cultural exchange and not slavery as they are in America, so an au-pair is supposed to work 20 hours a week, no heavy cleaning or cooking for the whole family, allowing time for language classes, at least one full weekend day free and a small stipend. This mother sent me a list of chores that was literally two Word pages long, including cleaning their pool, brushing several of their dogs, cooking dinners for the whole family, spring cleaning, keeping the garage tidy and a myriad other ridiculous things that had nothing to do with childcare. She kindly said she would do a schedule for me so that I could accomplish these tasks throughout the week in the mornings while the kids were in daycare and this way they wouldn't seem daunting. Considering I was to have the kids each day for 5 hours after daycare, I'm not sure it wouldn't worked out to 20 hours a week. She also said her current au-pair was feeling homesick and wanted to go home early... I'm guessing her current au-pair realised she wasn't going to learn any French and was spending the entire time polishing silver.

My then hostmother effectively forbade me going to that family (not that I was going to go myself) and then sent that French mother an email saying how she's not respecting the principles of au-pairing and giving the program a bad name and all that, and I have rarely loved my hostmother more - and I love her lots.

You're right. Working 30 hrs/wk for $300/month, and having to pay for my own French language courses + airfare + insurance, and have one day off a week to explore is a lot less like slave labor than working 45 hrs/wk for $195.75/week with 1.5 day off each week, plus having my airfare, insurance, and courses paid for, as well as having cultural outings included in my first week here, and then monthly for the remainder of the year.

I'm not going to argue about details with you, but working 20 hours a week and 45 hours a week is nowhere near comparable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was au-pair in Germany and had a fantastic time with a wonderful family. The experience was so great that I decided to do another year in France and started looking. I had been emailing with a mother who seemed nice and easy-going and we were almost going to set up a phone interview when she sent me a list of the chores she'd like me to do. Now, au-pair rules in Germany and France are much more along the lines of cultural exchange and not slavery as they are in America, so an au-pair is supposed to work 20 hours a week, no heavy cleaning or cooking for the whole family, allowing time for language classes, at least one full weekend day free and a small stipend. This mother sent me a list of chores that was literally two Word pages long, including cleaning their pool, brushing several of their dogs, cooking dinners for the whole family, spring cleaning, keeping the garage tidy and a myriad other ridiculous things that had nothing to do with childcare. She kindly said she would do a schedule for me so that I could accomplish these tasks throughout the week in the mornings while the kids were in daycare and this way they wouldn't seem daunting. Considering I was to have the kids each day for 5 hours after daycare, I'm not sure it wouldn't worked out to 20 hours a week. She also said her current au-pair was feeling homesick and wanted to go home early... I'm guessing her current au-pair realised she wasn't going to learn any French and was spending the entire time polishing silver.

My then hostmother effectively forbade me going to that family (not that I was going to go myself) and then sent that French mother an email saying how she's not respecting the principles of au-pairing and giving the program a bad name and all that, and I have rarely loved my hostmother more - and I love her lots.

You're right. Working 30 hrs/wk for $300/month, and having to pay for my own French language courses + airfare + insurance, and have one day off a week to explore is a lot less like slave labor than working 45 hrs/wk for $195.75/week with 1.5 day off each week, plus having my airfare, insurance, and courses paid for, as well as having cultural outings included in my first week here, and then monthly for the remainder of the year.

I'm not going to argue about details with you, but working 20 hours a week and 45 hours a week is nowhere near comparable.

Fair enough. I just thought that given the context of the other threads, and your reference, it's helpful to note that the hourly rate for au pairs in France is about half what it is in the US, plus APs in France are expected to also cover the major big ticket expenses associated with participating, and have fewer days guaranteed off.