Maids in Hong Kong now have a new line of work for their employers – standing in line for long periods of time to buy concert tickets.
As well as household chores, taking care of children and the elderly, queuing up along streets for long periods of time to buy concert tickets is the latest new task employers have added on the to-do list for their domestic workers.
Indonesian domestic worker Linda told news website HK01.com that her employers – a family of three – were huge fans of Dayo Wong Tze-wah, a local stand-up comedian and actor who is putting on a show in July.
Linda, who has worked in Hong Kong for 10 years, said her employers asked her to start queuing up in front of the ticket counter in Sha Tin Town Hall in the New Territories on Tuesday morning, one week before the sale of show tickets.
The employers wanted her to buy four tickets for each of the four shows. They said one ticket was for Linda, but she told the reporter she did not even know who Dayo Wong was. Linda took along a plastic stool and a suitcase and waited outside the town hall where a few empty chairs placed.
Pre-sale tickets to Wong’s show were sold out online in late March and next Tuesday tickets will go on sale. Staff from the town hall cleared the empty chairs at night and Linda left.
Meanwhile, a Filipina domestic worker named Niki was with about 40 friends waiting outside the Tom Lee Music store in Kowloon’s Tsim Sha Tsui on Tuesday morning to buy tickets to the shows. Some brought babies with them and sat on mattresses.
Niki claimed she was helping her employer buy tickets, adding that it was part of her job.
Scalpers snapped up tickets to Wong’s show last month and sold them for HK$15,000 (US$1,910) each – the original price was HK$880, Apple Daily reported.
Read: HK concert tickets selling for 17 times their cover price