REAL LIFE EXPERIENCES0
Mariam’s Story
BY ADMIN · JANUARY 20, 2019
Some years back, my husband and I sat down and decided that it was best for me to go try out my luck in one of the Gulf Countries whose name I wont mention due to some of the things that I will write as part of this story.
You see, I had a degree in Finance yet the salary that I was earning from one of the banks in Kenya wasn’t really enough to make us achieve all the dreams that we had lined up as a young couple. My husband at that time was a high school teacher and after all the taxes, we weren’t left with really much. We had big dreams, dreams of building flats and renting them out, the goal was to be so financially independent such that by the time we hit late 30’s we would both be self employed and travelling the world.
So after talking to a friend of mine who was at that time in the gulf, I decided to take that leap of faith and moved to Gulf on a visit visa leaving my husband behind and my three year old baby girl. It was heartbreaking especially for me to leave my baby behind but my consolation was that she would be well taken care of as my younger sister, Veronica, who had cleared high school at that time was living with us. So on one early morning, I waved my family good bye at JKIA and boarded a plane full of dreams, dreams so big that they literally got me scared.
I got off at a rocky start. Finding a job in my line of profession seemed to be aa real struggle and soon I started regretting why I had quit my job back home. The first month rolled by without getting called for even a single interview, the pressure was high up there and the stress was real. I felt like a loser and if not for my husband Steve, I probably would have given up and gone back home.
Being that I had only come on a one month visa, after the first month I had two options. To either renew it or pack back and go home. The thought of how people especially relatives would laugh at me and reality of going back home and starting to tarmac from scratch was too great and so all that coupled with the dreams I still carried, I renewed my visa for one final month.
The first week passed just like the ones before had passed with me getting no calls for interviews. It was during the second week that I decided to change tact and look for any job from Sales to waitress to Security and even house-keeping jobs. My goal was to first secure a working visa and then from there now look for a job in my line of expertise. Anyone who has been to the Gulf countries clearly understand this.
I woke up daily and hustled like my life depended on it and in the third week, my prayers got answered and I got offered a housekeeping job at one of the banks here. The salary offered was KSH 28,000, a figure lower than what I was being paid back home but I decided to take it all the same. I had dreams, I had plans and I had focus. I told myself that if others had come to this country and made it then I was going to be able to do the same.
I was so ashamed of the cleaning job and as a result only my husband knew the type of job that I was doing. But even with my degree and the fact that I graduated at the top of my class in Nairobi University didn’t make me look down on my cleaning job instead I was grateful for the chance that I was given and did it with my whole heart. If there’s something that my parents instilled in me at a young age, it’s humility. Do not despise the days of humble beginnings my sisters.
At the bank, I did my cleaning job exceptionally and even went beyond my key responsibilities and helped the workers there in doing small jobs like running errands for them, buying them their meals and sometimes directing customers to the various areas that they were looking for. Given my attitude and personality, I built a good relationship with everyone at the bank and soon I started receiving tips.
One day while cleaning some tea that had been spilled at the branch manager’s office, we got to talk a little bit and she asked me about my background etc. She was so shocked to learn of my qualifications and right away told me to send her my C.V which I did the following day. A week later, I was called for an interview and they were so impressed by my performance that they told me that vey moment that I was hired!
I couldn’t believe my luck! After 11 months of housekeeping jobs, God had finally changed my destiny. They started me off at a junior position and offered me 86,000 tax free which was way more than what I had previously earned. It was like my dreams were finally going to be realized.
I embarked on work harder than I had ever done. I ensured I did all that I was required to do and beyond and everyone took notice. Within a period of 9 months, I was promoted to a better position and given my raise, my salary hit six figures. All through I stayed thankful to God for He made it all possible. My husband was my biggest supporter, a true gentleman and my sister took on my daughter like hers. God bless you Veronica for being such a blessing in my life.
Within a period of 1 year, I was given another promotion and soon I was trusted with handling accounts of some very big key players in this country. It all turned out to be a blessing and soon I was making some great networks. It was from meeting some of those people and forming that relationship with them that I got one of the locals here who had shares at private school here to hire my husband. She agreed and within a month, my husband was sent an offer letter with a six figure salary together with a working visa. A week after, he relocated together with our baby to where I was and we got an Ethiopian nanny whom our baby completely adored. I sent my sister off to Moi Univesity where she pursued a Law degree on a parallel program.
The years that followed were blissful! We worked hard and soon I was buying properties back home. Steve was an amazing father and husband. Despite the fact that I was earning way more than him, he still took care of the house expenses from food to paying our nanny plus our daughter’s nursery fees. We were living in a house given to me by my company so rent was never an issue.I on the other hand stayed humble and submissive to my husband. Two years after Steve joined me, we were blessed with a baby boy who was a complete replica of his father. Our home was full of peace and laughter and love. We were perfect.
One Friday evening, Steve came home and alongside him was a lady who looked like she was going to drop dead at any minute. He took me to the bedroom and then told me the most heartbreaking story that I had ever heard in my entire life.
Steve told me that he was just a few blocks from home when he saw something that looked like a human being lying by the road side. He decided to reverse his car and when he got closer to it, he realized that it was indeed a lady and a Kenyan for that matter. He said that he got to talk to her and he learnt that she had been deceived from home that she was going to be given a cabin crew job but on getting here, he was turned into a nanny. He wanted to leave and go back home on so many occasion but the agent who picked her up from the airport told her that she was going to work as a house girl for a certain Arab family whether she liked it or not until she paid off all that he had invested in her coming. Her name she said was Terry.
Steve told me that Terry had told him of the suffering that she had undergone at the hand of her employer until she had eventually managed to escape and reported her case to the local authority. She said that she had gone to the Kenyan Embassy where her together with other girls who had ran away from their employers spent the night outside the Embassy office. They had stayed there without food or anything for days and she had eventually decided to leave after there had been two attempts to rape them by some men in the early morning hours. She said that her former employer had been summoned by the police and soon after everything was sorted, she would get her passport from them and go back home, that’s all she wanted.
By the time Steve finished narrating all this to me my eyes were red from crying. It reminded me of the so many cases that I had watched back home of the suffering that some of our people went through in the Gulf and I was glad that Terry had managed to escape and I was even more grateful to Steve for having brought her home so we could help her however we could.
I went to the guest room where I had told our house-girl to take her and one look at Terry and I could tell that the girl had been through hell. Her lips were red, dry and with some tears. Her eyes almost pale and when she talked her voice was almost faint. She told me that her employer had starved her on so many days and most times after eating the little that she was given once in a while, she was forced to drink Vinegar and other sour drinks whose names she never knew. Failure to drink them resulted into beating and eventually those drinks being forced down her throat. With her was a paper written in Arabic which she told me that she had been given at the police station. I offered to have her driven to the hospital for treatment but she declined saying that she just needed to feed for a few days after which she would be ok and so I left the hospital matter at that. Apart from all that, there was a very bad smell coming from her and I assumed that maybe that was due to the fact that she hadn’t taken shower for days.
I prepared soup for her first at her request and then ate dinner with her in the guest room. She showed me photos of a little boy whom she told me was her son. She had been married for about 5 years before getting a divorce since her husband was abusive. She informed that up until that time, she had not gotten the chance to call home and talk to her people since her employer had taken away her phone right from the day that she had started working for them. I gave her my phone so she could call her mum and then left so as to give her some privacy and as I closed the door to her room, I couldn’t help the tears that streamed down my cheeks.
The following day, we both left for work leaving Terry at the care of our amazing house-girl who kept me updated on her progress all through the day. She told me that she didn’t eat much and she spent most of the time sleeping. That evening I carried with me a lot of fruits which I helped Terry have and then made her more soup at her request. The smell that had been coming from her I noticed was getting worse despite being told that she had taken shower.
On her fourth day stay with us, I went to Terry’s room and found she had gone to use the toilet.(Her room had an attached bathroom) On her way out of the toilet, I could see how tired and weak she was. She was so weak that she had to walk by supporting herself on the wall. I helped her get to the bed and asked how she was feeling to which she responded that she was feeling better but from the look of things, that was by far not true. Up until this time she had turned down the suggestion of me taking her to the hospital twice.
The smell that was coming from the bathroom that she had use was so strong and so I decided to go flash the toilet and then close the bathroom door before continuing our conversation since even the opened windows weren’t of help.
I got to the toilet and shock on me, in the toilet bowl were huge clots of dark brown blood followed by some drops of the same on the bathroom door. That’s when it hit me that she must be in some life threatening condition. The only thing on my mind was that the vinegar and the sour drinks which she had said her employer had been forcing her to drink must have corroded the lining of her stomach or something hence the clots. I’m not a medic and so I panicked.
I got back to her and told her that I was taking her to the hospital right at that moment whether she liked it or not as I was never going to forgive myself if say something happened to her. She totally refused and even started crying but I wasn’t having any of that.
Amidst her protest, my house-girl and I carried her to my car and off to the hospital I drove. She had no insurance cover and despite the fact that treatment is very expensive in this country, I was going to go through with it because the human life is way more precious than any amount of wealth or money.
We got to the hospital and we were soon attended to. She was too weak to talk much and so I brought the doctor up to speed on everything that she had told us. Several tests were done on her some whose names I really cant remember but I remember feeling at peace and reassuring her that all was going to be well.
A few hours of waiting I was summoned into the doctor’s office. From the doctor’s tone of voice and facial expression I could tell that something was terribly wrong. She calmly addressed Terry and her words were, “Do you want to tell this kind lady the truth or should I?”
I was surprised but all this, I couldn’t even understand what she was referring to or where the conversation was headed. Terry didn’t say a word and after moments of waiting having repeated the question twice, the doctor revealed to me that from the tests that they had done, the truth was that Terry had had an abortion and it hadn’t been done well and so she had residue of that left in her womb and that at that very moment, part of that ilikuwa imeoza etc etc.
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I was about to get mad at her when I told myself that perhaps she had been sexually abused too by her employer and that maybe she had been too ashamed to let me know of that bit.
The doctor told me that she couldn’t risk having her admitted at their facility without alerting the authorities given the country’s laws. (Those who have lived in Gulf understand this)
On our drive back home, I tried getting Terry to open up to me but she refused to say a word. I reminded her of the doctor’s warning that she could die given what the results had indicated and that I couldn’t help her unless she was totally honest with me. That didn’t move her until I mentioned her son. At her son’s mention, she broke down so bad and had her head on my shoulder. She kept saying, “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry.”
Once she was calm, she told me things that changed my entire existence. She told me that she had lied to me all this while at the insistence of Steve. She told me that her real name was Annie and that she had actually lived in the same country as us for the last 3 years. She initially had a job but was laid off when the company filed for bankruptcy. After that she had tried looking for another job and when her visa period was over, she didn’t exit the country and instead had stayed and turned to prostitution. Not the kind of prostitution where one stands on the streets but the type where you get me online and then sleep with them for cash.
She told me that she had done that for a living for sometime until she had met my husband Steve on her way out in a shopping mall. They had started out as friends but within a month they were sleeping together. Right from the beginning Steve had told her that she was married but was on the verge of getting a divorce. She told me that Steve used to give her large sums of money and would mostly pay her rent and so she decided to stop sleeping with other men and be with Steve exclusively. Soon, she was madly in love with him and so was him with her.
They had carried on with the affair for about a year and then she had discovered that she was pregnant. It was after telling Steve of the pregnancy that he started telling her to get rid of it since he loved his family i.e. us and that being with her had been a mistake. She had told him that she wasn’t going to go through with an abortion and Steve had sweet talked her and told her that if she got rid of it then the two of them could carry on with the affair and that’s when she had agreed to it.
At her friend’s advice, she had drunk a concoction together with vinegar given to her by a certain mama in the hope that it would destroy the pregnancy. She had bled profusely after that and had been in untold pain. Steve upon seeing all that had gotten a friend of his who said was a medic and that friend had stabilized things for a few days but had quit attending to her when things got really bad and that’s when Steve had brought her home both having agreed on the lies to tell me. (They couldn’t have gone directly to the hospital as that would have put them both in trouble because 1, she was in the country illegally, 2, they weren’t married and yet sleeping together which is illegal here and 3, she had an abortion which is considered a crime here)
I told her right away that she was making it all up and asked her why she would tell such lies to break my family up. There was just no way that my Steve could have been having another woman on the side leave alone get her pregnant and ask her to abort.
She saw the look on my face and reached into her bra and pulled out a smart phone, I was so taken aback given how this girl had played me. She got to her WhatsApp messages were texts from my dear Steve. For 40 minutes or more, I went through a series of their texts. I noticed that he used to send her the love quotes that I sent him sometimes during the day. There were naked photos of him and messages from him asking her to do the abortion and promising to divorce me and be with her. To top it all off, there were short clips of them having sex. By the time I was done going through everything, I was almost throwing up.
I was so mad, I was filled with rage. I was mad at Annie or Terry but most importantly I was mad at my husband because it was to him that I had pledged my vows. How could he betray me and our kids like that? How could he risk our health by having unprotected sex with another woman.
It was while in that state of anger that Steve walked in. One look at us and the smile he had on his face was wiped off. My house girl had taken the kids to the park so it was just us. I confronted him with the true and he flatly denied everything until i showed him the evidence that was his mistress’ phone.
He looked so shocked and for a minute I thought that his eyes were going to pop off of their sockets. I asked him what plan he had having brought his dying mistress to our home and he couldn’t even answer that. He was crying and begging for another chance sighting the devil for all his mistakes. His pleas fell on deaf ears and once he was done, I told him to pack and get off of my house before I called the police on both of them.
After he left, I turned to his mistress and advised her that the best thing for her was to turn herself over to the authorities so that she could be deported back home where she could get proper treatment and she agreed. That very night, I drove her to a police station. I wont go into details of what happened at the station but after two days in hospital under tight security, she was deported back to Kenya where she had her sister whose contact she had given me waiting for her at the hospital ready to take her for further treatment with the cash I had sent her. As much as I hated her for having carried on an affair with my husband despite having known of my existence, I still felt that I needed to help her however I could because in this life nobody knows what tomorrow holds. As I write this, she has since fully recovered and is back with her baby daddy.
As for my Steve, one phone call to the friend who had linked him up with the job and he was laid off work. He tried searching for work after that am told but never got a good offer and so he went back home where he currently is. All the properties we had bought are under my name and so he basically has nothing. I just couldn’t bring myself to forgiving him after betraying me to the levels that he did.
I have since moved on and I’m currently on my second marriage to a man who is worth it all. He’s been an amazing father to my kids and together we also have three other children. 8 years of being married to him and I can say the he really is THE ONE.
My advise to you ladies, don’t stay with a man who doesn’t deserve you out of fear of being alone. After all the hurt and pain, you can still be happy. Your soul mate is out here, I’m so glad I found mine.
*Khalas*
admin
A girl who dreams of changing the world
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