‘Everything was so fast’: Malaysian nanny’s brush with a scam
2024.10.24
Kuala Lumpur
If not for some quick thinking, Malaysian nanny Nurul Huda Ahmad believes she could have been trapped by a syndicate into being trafficked into Myanmar and working at a scam center there.
The plight of Malaysians and citizens of other Southeast Asian countries who were lured into Myanmar and recruited for jobs under false pretenses has made headlines. More than 500 Malaysians have been rescued from scam centers in Myanmar and Cambodia since 2022, according to the Malaysian government’s latest data.
Nurul Huda, 41, who says she remains traumatized by what she experienced earlier this month, has filed a complaint about it with Malaysian police. After appearing at an Oct. 22 press conference in Kuala Lumpur organized by a local NGO, the Malaysian Humanitarian Organization, she shared her story with BenarNews:
I’ve been a nanny in Malaysia for five years. Most of my clients are expatriates and other high-end clients.
I also worked in various countries such as Indonesia, Japan and the United Arab Emirates, assisting expatriates and businesswomen in babysitting their children during their travels or meetings.
Many people who wanted me to work for them as a nanny also approached me the same way.
So, when someone messaged me on Oct. 8 and said he found me on Facebook and he was looking for a nanny for four days, it sounded like a normal gig offer to me.
“Kent,” the man who messaged me, told me he was working for a diplomat in Bangkok and that he needed someone to accompany his wife and their two kids who had been planning to visit him in Thailand.
The gig was only for four days, from Oct. 13 to 17.
He asked if I was interested and if so, he would like to conduct a brief interview via a video call.
I thought about the new offer and I told myself, “Why not?” After all, it would be my first gig overseas, after giving birth to my youngest in July.
So, I told him I was interested and we did the video call on Oct. 10. In our call, I saw “Kent” and who I assumed was his wife. Both looked Chinese and likely in their 30s. Their background looked like it was an office setting.
“Kent” spoke Indonesian, but I can still understand the words.
I discussed my pay. I told them my rate was RM 240 (U.S. $55) a day. I also said I could only cater to a maximum of two children. Not more.
“Kent” and his companion even told me they wanted to pay me more. RM 500 ($115) a day – that’s their offer to me.
Their offer was more than my usual rate. I asked why he was giving me a higher offer.
“Kent” said it was a token of appreciation for my service because I have to accompany his wife and help her take care of their two young kids, 4 and 1 years old.
I also have four children so I thought the offer would be the best way to kickstart my work after a long three-month break.
We ended our conversation by agreeing to our terms, which included a return flight ticket. He sent me my tickets on Oct. 12.
Trip to Bangkok
I arrived at the Don Mueang International Airport in Bangkok on Oct. 13, past noon.
Someone wearing a Thai customs shirt and an ID approached me. I was convinced he was a customs officer since only authorities could enter the area.
He took me to an immigration fast lane where my passport got stamped instantly. Soon after, a driver came to pick me up.
Everything was so fast that I didn’t get a chance to convert my ringgit to baht or buy a Thai SIM card. But at that time, I did not find anything suspicious.
I started feeling something was not right when “Kent” messaged me, saying I got a new destination but did not explain the reason why. He also did not provide me with additional details.
“Kent” also did not meet with me. All our communication since arriving in Bangkok was just through text and call.
‘New’ destination
So, from the airport in Bangkok, the driver and I traveled to this new destination.
I didn’t know getting to the “new” destination meant staying on the road for at least six hours, passing through endless highways that felt like a very long time.
Finally, we stopped at an area. It was already dark.
I checked the time: 8 p.m.
I still didn’t know where we were. Luckily, I was able to connect my phone to my driver’s mobile hotspot. I looked at my location on the Google map. We were near Thailand’s border with Myanmar.
We stopped near the local immigration checkpoint and saw we were in the city of Mae Sot in the Thai province of Tak, which lies just along the border with Myanmar to the west.
The driver told me to hand over my passport to the police so that I would be allowed to enter Myanmar. I refused.
Still, the driver kept insisting that I do so.
I quickly walked out of the car and sought help.
I told one police officer that I believed I had been scammed. I also told him I didn’t know anyone in Mae Sot. But the police officer’s English was so poor he had to call his wife, a schoolteacher, to help translate what I said.
The police let the driver go. But “Kent” kept contacting me over the phone, trying very hard to persuade me to cross the border and promising to pay me more for all my troubles.
I brought some hundreds of ringgit with me but I couldn’t find any of it when we were there at the border.
Thankfully, the police officer I talked to was kind enough to buy me a bus ticket to Bangkok.
He also told me that if I got my passport stamped along the border and crossed to Myanmar, there was nothing they could do to help me.
Journey home
Upon arriving in Bangkok, I called my husband and booked a train to the southern Thai city of Hat Yai. The train journey alone took more than 15 hours.
Then, finally, I arrived in Padang Besar, Malaysia’s northernmost town on Oct. 15.
I did not mind the long hours. I was too scared to take a flight home. “Kent” might have some people stationed at the airport.
It also did not help that the return ticket he provided me was not really home sweet home.
It was a flight ticket from Thailand to the Philippines.
“Kent” had told me earlier that his staff had submitted the wrong details to their travel agency and promised to send me a new ticket. But I never got the revised return ticket.
Tough lesson
After I arrived home in Kuala Lumpur via train several hours later, I notified the local police about what happened to me. I was not able to report the incident to Thai authorities because I just wanted to leave the country as fast as I could.
Since then, I have not heard anything from “Kent.” He just stopped texting me.
Looking back, I read about people who fell victim to syndicates and were smuggled to Myanmar. But it never occurred to me that something like that might happen to me.
I do not know where I found the courage to refuse the driver when he pressed me to hand over my passport to the local police in Tak.
All I could think of was my four young children and my husband at home.