7th June 2023 – (Taipei) Many families hire foreign domestic workers to take care of their children and elderly relatives in Taiwan. When they find a caregiver who is responsible and loves their children, they consider themselves lucky. One Indonesian domestic worker, Siti Aisyah, took care of a Taiwanese family’s son with Down Syndrome for ten years. When the mother showed no interest in taking care of him and even contemplated ending his life, Siti couldn’t bear to leave him behind. She took him back to her hometown in Indonesia to care for him, but unfortunately, the boy’s father died four years ago, leaving Siti without a source of income.
According to a report in Taiwanese media, Siti Aisyah recently shared her story with an Indonesian influencer. She said she started working for the Huang family in Taiwan in 2013 and took care of their son with Down Syndrome, who was 14 years old at the time. When her contract ended in 2019, she agreed with the father to take the boy to Indonesia to care for him, and the father would continue to pay her salary.
Siti couldn’t bear to see the boy being mistreated by his mother, who didn’t want to take care of him and even thought about abandoning him or worse. As the father worked as a security guard and couldn’t take care of his son, Siti decided to take the boy back to Indonesia with her.
However, shortly after arriving in Indonesia, the boy’s father passed away, and his family stopped sending Siti money. Despite contacting the boy’s mother and family, Siti received no response. She even went to their home, only to find they had moved out and thrown away the boy’s clothes. Siti has been struggling to pay for the boy’s medical expenses and support her own family ever since.
The boy is now 24 years old, and his Indonesian residency permit has expired. Siti’s interview with the influencer has garnered attention from Indonesian and Taiwanese netizens, who are calling for help to bring the boy back to Taiwan. The Taiwan representative office in Indonesia has been in contact with the Indonesian immigration office to resolve the boy’s expired residency issue and is trying to contact his family to bring him back to Taiwan.