Indonesian caretaker experiences in providing child care to Taiwanese children

The purpose of this study was to learn about the experiences of Indonesian nannies in caring for Taiwanese children in Taiwan. An ethnography method was adopted, using in-depth interviews with 52 respondents, 20 of whom were Indonesians employed as caretakers for Taiwanese children and 32 of whom were general informants. Twenty-six of the general informants were Indonesian child caretakers, and six were employers. Audio-taping of interview sessions was permitted by all respondents. Transcriptions of the interviews were written up verbatim. Leininger's (1991) Phases of Analysis for qualitative data was adopted to analyze data. Four themes were extracted from the analysis, including "Learning diverse information from the beginning--the employer's family," "Complying with the advice of the child's mother," "Maintaining the child's daily activities and health," and "Awareness of external context influences on child care." The findings indicated that Indonesian child caretakers carry with them the values, beliefs, and lifestyles of their own culture and have their own ingrained ideas regarding how best to provide care for their Taiwanese charges. Health care providers, by better understanding the general experiences of Indonesian caretakers in Taiwan, can apply competent intervention to help caretakers overcome the challenges of working within a different cultural environment. It is hoped that the results of this study can promote cultural competence in childcare within the context of internationalism.