Together, we are stronger

 Cleaning experience part II…. of many.

When I got my degree from university and got a job as a graphic designer in Colombia. I realized that in Colombia on some occasions, or based on my experience, many employees were afraid to speak up over unfair situations for fear of being fired, and because they have needs. At that time I was a fearful and submissive employee, I must admit.

I used to believe that I needed to make sacrifices, staying late at work, accepting the bosses' requests, having long work hours without receiving extra payment and well… an endless number of conditions that companies have in Colombia. Being afraid, accepting mistreatment and staying quiet was normal for me. I felt that there was no camaraderie when it came to understanding or defending a co-worker in trouble, which is understandable, because everyone is saving their own skin.

Anyway, after having horrible bosses, frustrating experiences where I cried a lot because of injustices and workplace harassment (it must be said, not all are like that), but I had bad experiences in Colombia, specifically in the advertising agency where I started my first job. Over there, people finished work at 3am, and the earliest at 9pm, when the work day is supposed to end at 6pm. The owner of this agency made fun of all the employees and I heard stories of sexual harassment by the guy, who thought he was a casanova but was a poor idiot, who purposely made fun of my voice too, but hey, karma is blessed, mijitos!!

Another stressful job was with the health department of the Bogotá mayor's office. The boss there was very annoying, nagging, gossipy, sexist, the worst boss I've ever had... he said that women were the gossips and that I should tell him everything I heard around me, so who is the gossip…? In other words, the man was paranoid that someone else would take his job away. At that time, I also had a colleague who advised me that I should stop being silly and scared (in other words, not to let the boss get on me, and that I should speak up). Well, that stuck in my head.

When I arrived in Australia, it was my big dream. I promised myself that I would not allow mistreatment at work, that I would stop being scared and that I would speak up if some difficult situation occur at work. During the time I worked as a cleaner, I met my colleagues with whom we became very close and with some we established a friendship that still lasts. 

Let me tell you that it was a lovely friendship. Before starting work we met in the building's café to share snacks. We brought Tim Tam´s, cookies, and chocolates. Each one bought something to share with a cup of tea before the shift. We were migrant students from Indonesia, Thailand and obviously my Latin people.

Let's continue with the point of the story. At that time, they changed one of the bosses and a new boss who I am going to name R. This man had a good-natured face but as the saying goes, he was a wolf in sheep's clothing.

It turns out that R, was somewhat flirtatious with some of us, it was kind of uncomfortable to be honest. I think that in a certain way because of the media, some people have the stereotype that we Latinas are "hot" or "easy", that we like anyone who breathes.. Ehh no amigos, it's not true. So that was the case of R.

Over time, Mr. R became more demanding and demanding when he saw that we were not playing along with his flirtatious game or who knows... The fact is that R began to harass us all at work, he was bothering us for absolutely everything, even the smallest fingerprint on a table that we did not clean, I mean it was very absurd.

One Christmas, the company had a celebration, where we danced, played Secret Santa, some were drinking and this man was very happy and decided to give some of the girls a kiss on the cheek, which at the time was disturbing but I think we normalized his disgusting act.

Covid arrived and boss R was worse every day, his harassment was horrible, he threatened us all the time that he was going to fire us, and well imagine in Covid times there was a lot of fear, many of us were student immigrants, and the Australian government was not giving subsidies to students in 2020 plus it was difficult to travel home.

With some friends, Mr. R was very flirtatious and strange. One time, my vacuum cleaner cable broke, because obviously it's normal for cables to break when cleaning such large floors. I called him to explain the problem with the cable. Mr. R was furious! He yelled at me on the phone and told me that if another cable broke, he would kick me out. Indeed, after a few months, the cable broke again and I panicked. What am I going to do? Should I buy a new cable and put it in the trolley without him noticing? I even asked my friends: what do I do? And two of my friends would lend me the cable at certain times, and we were all scared. We felt like we couldn't even breathe because this man was going to start threatening to kick us out, because he did it almost every day.

Little by little, my friends started getting fired and some started to quit. At that time, we started talking to my beautiful, revolutionary, and strong Chilean friend. We asked ourselves why we should be afraid? I remembered a lot of what I told myself when I came to Australia, no more fear, raise your voice and well we started to communicate, to express ourselves with all our colleagues, and most of us felt very similar and were tired of workplace harassment.

We wrote a letter to HR (Human Resources) without much result, they didn't want to listen to us. One of my colleagues from Thailand and Colombia went to the police because the man was flirting towards them and the police asked them if this had happened to other people, and it is indeed sexual harassment. Then we found out and we realized that some of us were victims of his harassment in some way because it happened at Christmas! (the kiss on the cheek without consent) because in Australia sexual harassment is a serious crime, which I think is wonderful because touching without consent is violating our rights and we should not normalize it.

Finally, HR paid attention to us. Many employees, men and women, wrote a formal letter where we explained what happened from each one's experience. Some friends did not want to "harm the man's life", they warned us to be careful because it is a very strong accusation... I mean, he can threaten us, insult us, harass us and we should allow it? I don't think so, amiga, we do NOT look prettier when we keep silent. Calladitas NO nos vemos más bonitas.

HR opened an investigation case, they interrogated us asking us about everything that happened. I felt like in a detective case and like if I were doing something bad with the questions they asked. They asked me why I had not spoken at the time when the kiss on the cheek incident happened, they also asked me on which cheek (right or left) the man had kissed me, they asked if we spoke to our colleagues and well, an endless number of questions.

After a few days, they fired R, and I personally felt fulfilled. I was happy with the support, the camaraderie we had and the fact that we did not keep quiet, that we were a team where we understand the pain of others, the fear of others and we fight injustice. It is possible to have justice when we come together, because together we are stronger. We never know who the next victim might be, but we do know that together we are more powerful and together we will win.

Thank you, dear friends, for showing me your support and feeling that there are more good people in the world and that by supporting each other we can go further. Making decisions based on fear? NEVER.

Because in the end our own lives are at stake.

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” — African proverb

Con cariño.

Laura Maria.