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FeedThe Manny Diaries
Would you trust your children with a male au pair? More and more busy Main Line families are doing just that. Not to worry, though—women still call most of the shots in the nanny trade.
Photos by Carlos Alejandro Published September 16, 2009 at 01:18 PM
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At Jen and Charles Reid’s spacious home on a Berwyn cul-de-sac, 1-year-old A.J. pounds on the screen door, 6-year-old twin sisters Marta and Grace wrestle on a couch and 9-year-old Michael is figuring out his math homework. Older siblings Lizzie, 10, and Charlie, 11, are at lacrosse practice and a baseball game.
The Reids are an affluent family—and busy enough to be featured in a 2007 Time magazine story on childcare. So it’s hardly unusual that they’ve summoned help from an au pair. Audrey Daniel Caldas Jales is the family’s fourth, and the first who isn’t female.
A 21-year-old from Brazil, Jales represents a mini-trend of sorts on the Main Line—that of male nannies, or mannies. Of the 175 au pairs currently assigned to Main Line homes through the national placement agency Cultural Care Au Pair, 34 are male, a figure that’s up 130 percent.
When Jales signed on, there were only five kids, though Jen was pregnant with A.J. “It was a little bit easier when there were just five,” he admits.
As for the “manny” moniker, Jales says it doesn’t bother him, even though he hails from such a “macho country as Brazil.” “My friends say, ‘I can’t believe you’re taking care of kids—that’s for girls,’” he says. “But I don’t see what’s so girly about it.”
Back when Jen had three kids under 3, the household was manageable. But when she found out she was pregnant with twins, out came the white flag. Her husband is a King of Prussia lawyer—and while she’s home full time, she volunteers at the kids’ schools and is forever running errands.
Of Jen’s eight brothers and sisters, four have used au pairs. She had three consecutive au pairs, took a year off, then opted for Jales. His application met their requirements: He doesn’t smoke, he drives well, he can swim, and he taught English in a daycare center in Brazil. “We looked at many applications, and it seemed like all the girls fell short,” Jen says. “It’s so important that I understand that he’s here to help me, not replace me—and so there’s mutual respect. I know families who treat their au pairs unjustly, where it’s been a disaster.”
With the Reids for a year and a half, Jales gets a day and a half off per week and one weekend a month, during which au pairs are encouraged to travel. Through Cultural Care Au Pair, he’s guaranteed two weeks paid vacation, though the Reids have allowed him a third week. He must take a minimum of six credits or 72 hours of classes, toward which the host family commits $500 a year. Before Cultural Care au pairs are placed, they must have 200 hours of childcare experience and at least 200 hours of infant-care experience (if looking after a child under 2).
There’s a certain cultural curve for every au pair. In his first week, Jales was cited for running a stop sign on the way to the King of Prussia Mall. “In Brazil, you don’t have to stop if there isn’t another car coming,” Jales says. “All the way home, I was thinking, ‘How am I going to tell the Reids. I didn’t even get paid yet, and I owed $150. I told Jen, and she said, ‘It’s OK. I get some [tickets], too.’”
Many times, the Reids simply need a second driver. On a Saturday, there may be a birthday party and a game. “It’s tough to be in two places at once,” Jen says. “Sometimes, he’ll go grocery shopping, but Daniel always spends more than me. So I have to give him a $200 limit.”
Diapers, says Jales, are really the only dirty business. “I mainly hate it when the diaper comes with chocolate,” he says. “But A.J. only peed on me twice.”
