At TedxTinHauWomen on November 14, Eny Bawse, an Indonesian domestic worker in Hong Kong, took to the stage to share her journey in overcoming depression and founding Self-Love Cupid, a social media platform that wants to normalise discussing mental health issues among her peers
Eny Bawse learnt English watching Ted talks. Her busy schedule as a domestic worker—first in her native Indonesia, then in Singapore and finally in Hong Kong—left her with little choice but to listen to these talks right before going to sleep, usually after 11pm. Looking back at her life, Bawse, who’s 35 now, would have never imagined that she would eventually end up on that kind of stage herself.
“At that time, I was so inspired by these speakers.” she tells Tatler in an interview, with tears in her eyes. “It’s like I manifested it.”
Bawse was selected by Hong Kong’s TedXTinHauWomen to shed light on the unique challenges faced by domestic workers and the acute need for employers to offer empathy and resources. “The importance of well-being at the workplace has become increasingly important and recognised. It’s only fair to also target our workplaces, even though they may seem untraditional for some,” she says.
Speaking to us ahead of her talk at the TedxTinHauWomen, which took place on November 14 at Xiqu Centre, Bawse says, “Campaigns for our rights usually target us directly or NGOs, or maybe labour unions or the government. So I had this idea to talk directly to our employers through TedxTedxTinHauWomen. But I realised that I had to talk about myself, because my story was the story of most domestic workers around me.”
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Mental health struggles of domestic workers
When she was 15, Bawse started working as a domestic worker in Jakarta, after her family decided to take her out of school to prioritise her younger brother’s education. “In our small village, there were only two options left for me. Getting married or working as a domestic worker in the capital. I didn’t know much about life, so I decided to start working.”
After working for two and a half years in Jakarta, she got employed in Singapore. It was there that her mental health started to deteriorate. The strict employment laws in Singapore, as well as society’s treatment of domestic workers, left her feeling isolated. “I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere by myself, and my only contact with the world, my friends, family, was through the payphone downstairs.” She lasted three years in that environment.
She came to Hong Kong 13 years ago, but even then the state of her mental health was poor. “At that point, I realised I had already been a domestic worker for more than a decade and I didn’t know who I was, what I wanted in life and why I was in Hong Kong. I literally had nothing to my name.”