In worst of times, women do the heavy lifting

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This was published 12 years ago

In worst of times, women do the heavy lifting

By Michelle Griffin

WHEN the shadow slid past the window at 3am, Denise Menashe realised her client's husband was waiting outside.

As the owner of Soul Sisters Removals, a company specialising in removals for women fleeing dangerous relationships, Ms Menashe is always watchful.

Denise Menashe and her daughters, Naomi (left) and Amy, have started a removals company  that specialises in moving people going through trauma.

Denise Menashe and her daughters, Naomi (left) and Amy, have started a removals company that specialises in moving people going through trauma.Credit: Penny Stephens

''He was hiding in the bushes,'' she says. ''That means we had to go for a scenic tour of Melbourne.''

They let him lurk. Ms Menashe's husband, Erez, was waiting behind the wheel of the van and drove in circles until they lost the lurker.

Moving is stressful at the best of times, and the Soul Sisters work only with clients at the worst of times. Many of them are terrified to return to their houses to collect their possessions. ''Just to put a key in the door opens that can of worms again,'' says Ms Menashe.

Soul Sisters is a family business. Denise Menashe, 45, works with the family violence clients. Daughter Naomi Fonteyn, 25, handles jobs for the elderly. Daughter Amy Fonteyn, 22, shifts the disabled. Husband Erez Menashe drives the truck, manages the heaviest loads, and trains the employees - many of whom are women.

Forty years after David Williamson's play The Removalists first unpacked the issue of domestic violence, Ms Menashe and her daughters are rewriting the script by mixing social work with heavy lifting.

In the six months Soul Sisters has been in operation, it has become the go-to company for agencies that need someone to pack up the lives of the anguished, the disabled, the broken. Sometimes charities cover the costs, sometimes clients pay in instalments through Centrelink.

Soul Sisters' first job was a foreclosure. Ms Menashe and a team of four other women had to pack as much as possible for a woman who had fled an arranged marriage. They had four hours, the sheriff on the nature strip told them. ''Mate,'' she said, ''you're about to do the hardest work in your life.'' When he said he wasn't allowed to help, she laughed. ''You like to watch women work?''

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Sure enough, she says, he took off his jacket and started shifting the furniture. ''I said, 'Thanks, mate, I knew you were here for a good reason.' ''

Ms Menashe and her daughters learnt to pack quickly in the three years they spent on the run from her ex-partner. ''We spent some very eventful years, shall we say, packing, unpacking, moving. Sometimes in the middle of the night, he'd show up. We had to collect our garbage bags full of clothes and throw them in the car and start out again, destination unknown.''

Years later, happily remarried and working in a regular removals business, Ms Menashe decided to specialise in helping women in distress. ''Having been in a refuge myself, I understand the importance of security. We are No. 1, 100 per cent attention on that,'' she says. ''Also - with no disrespect to the male race - they're very good at fixing problems but they're not very good when a broken female is sitting in a mess in her house surrounded by boxes.''

Ms Menashe is fine boned with a wild tangle of hair and nails she tries to keep manicured. Her daughters are not Amazons either. Every day, someone tells them women aren't strong enough to shift furniture. ''Being smaller has its pros and cons,'' says Ms Menashe. ''I can get into tiny spaces to move boxes. And I'm not afraid to lift anything.''

Amy says, laughing: ''One elderly gentleman asked if we were like the Meter Maids. We're not the women truckers you were expecting, are we?''

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