The Other Me, The Other You

It's not about cloning or clones. In fact it's not even new this idea of services that a couple of Spanish companies had come up with: offering personal and/or domestic assistance to those who have tight work schedule, or prefer to indulge the little free time they have in fun activities rather than mundane daily household chores. They would do just about anything at all you want done for you, for a fee of course. They do mean everything: from filling up your fridge with your daily need, take the dog for a walk, accompanying your children to and from school, arrange and organise your home, making sure you have the right suit and tie for attending the premiere of an opera, feed your budgie, cat or goldfish ... To sending roses to your new conquest or even writing love poems on your behalf ...

Long before now there have been similar services offered like personal shopper or trainer, secretary who does a lot more than typing and correspondence, and personal assistants, and the popularly called cleaning ladies, housekeeper, nannies or the type I know best when I lived in Hong Kong, the household servant or maids. The only difference is that the things they will do for you now, depending how much you pay, include a lot more than the basic household chores.

These companies claim that they are meticulously thorough, starting with a lengthy first interview to get to know their clients' needs, so that they can do things for you exactly like you would have done had you had the time or energy to do so. Hence the slogan on the advertising 'The other You, The other Me'. I would have thought that if they do things exactly like what I do, I wouldn't have engaged them; I would have expected them to do everything better than I can, to justify or deserve the high charges.

The charges are fixed accordingly, job to job, without an established scale. As a general guide, from €600 to €3,000 per month. I wouldn't have thought there are not too many who can afford to pay €3,000. That would mean the client would have to earn several times that figure. Well that excludes me altogether! Back to the kitchen sink MoiMoii.

Tags:kitchensink,homehelp

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