Hi there,

Decision Making

I have had a hard time in making my decision when I first decided to join the Au Pair program. Beside to let my family understand and support me to make it happen, I have to put down my career and also another great chance to further for higher level of academy of UK qualification. After I've been accepted into APIA, it took time to wait for any call from host families. Fortunately, APIA Malaysia Forum helped out a lot in giving advices, suggestions, even introduce the current Au Pairs in United States or other Pre-Au Pairs like me. Finally I've made up my mind to accept one of the six families in my list and fly to US after 3 months. I feel lucky too because I was able to meet my host father in Malaysia before I departed.

My host family live in Palmer, Massachusetts US. My host father works in Malaysia and my host mother works near Boston. There are three children in the family who are: Daniel (17years old), Ashley (15 years old) and Ian (6 years old). My main responsibility is Ian. My daily duties including: wake the kid up and prepare breakfast, put him to bus and get him from bus after school, teach him on his homework, play with him and drive him to practice, classes or activities, clean his play room, our share bathroom and bedroom. Sometimes I have to drive the other kids to their practices and activities too.

At the beginning, it's really hard for me to get into their family. It's a normal circumstance due to I was still a stranger to them although I'm not the first Au Pair that they have. Also different lifestyle and culture are another reason that hard to communicate to each other. Nevertheless, 2 minor accidents which happened within a week in the winter caused my homesick got worse than I expected. Crying was the only way that I could let out my stresses. However, the understanding, care and help from my host family, my family's and friends' support made me overcame it easily in a short period. Since then, I have a group of Malaysian Au Pairs that we called each other like family. I celebrated the first Chinese New Year in US with my Au Pair "sisters" in New York. When I got home in Massachusetts, I felt so touched because my host family decorated my room with a lot of Chinese New Year stuff and I had a $20 angpow that made me almost cried.

As time went by, my host family and I are getting closer to each other and I feel like I'm part of the family. Recently all of us went to Malaysia for our summer vacation. I had been told that I'm the first Au Pair in Malaysia that have a chance to go home during the program year without paying my airfare. I was so happy to meet my family and best friends that apart for half year. I had a great time in Malaysia with my host family. My Au Pairs family: Apin Ong, Pei Yee Choong, Crystal Ng, Annie Hu, Chloe Tang, Amy Tin, Yi Duan and Annabelle Tan, we all always help out each other and meet up often to sight-seeing to a lot of places. I've been to Philadephia PA, New York, Boston MA, Houston TX, Washington DC and more in just 8 months. It really makes me feel so good that I can travel around to see something new. My life even busier after I get the chance study in UMASS Amherst MA. I have a lot of friends who come from most of the countries around the world.

I'm now having a satisfied life that I always want and I'm so happy each day. Besides sharing experiences with the current Au Pairs, we also help out in giving advices and comments to other Au Pairs who will arrive soon. Thanks to Aceglobal and APIA for providing a link to a brand new life and experience in way to live and study in US.