Fortitude
The story below from NSTOnline is indeed a story worthy of the title of this topic. Some if not most of us, if I may say so, should really count our blessings. Do hope that children such as these succeed in life. They surely deserved it if they’re willing to go through such hardship just to have a better future in life.
Read on.
LONG, DARK TREK
TO SCHOOL
Sisters walk an hour daily to school in the pitch dark, barefooted, with only a small kerosene lamp
Roy Goh
PENAMPANG, Jan 3:
Several million children started the school year today, but few would have to go through what Jalisa Jium, 7, and her elder sister Wendy, 12, face every day.
Up before dawn, they put on their uniforms, heft their backpacks and set off for school, an hour’s walk away in the pitch dark, their path lit by a small kerosene lamp set in a bamboo holder.
The distance is just 3km but the trail they take winds across steep jungle hills with thick foliage on one side and sheer ravines on the other.
They wear no shoes, picking their way along the narrow root-tangled and rock-strewn path and crossing a river in their bare feet.
Only when they reach the other side, do they reach into their backpacks to pull out and don their socks and shoes, still pristine and white.
They walk barefoot to keep their school shoes clean, they said.
CLEANING UP: Wendy and Jalisa Jium cleaning up before putting on their shoes after coming out of the jungle trail at a river in Kampung Kibambangan. — NST picture by Datu Ruslan Sulai
Jalisa is in Year Two and Wendy Year Six. They live in Kampung Lutung, less than 40km from Kota Kinabalu, as the crow flies.
But the tiny hamlet lies deep within the Crocker Range, one of 10 villages linked only by footpaths first beaten by their forefathers in ages past.
And Kg Lutung is the village furthest from the closest school, SK Putaton, located along the Penampang-Tambunan road. There are 103 children from the villages, and most of them walk to school.
“Except for the Lutung children, the others would walk about half-an-hour at most,” said Tony Raymond, who guided the New Straits Times to the Jium home.
For Jalisa and Wendy, the daily trek is routine. They usually make good time, familiar with the trail.
“Going to school is normally easy because it’s downhill. If it’s dry, we can reach there in an hour. But the return trip is always tiring,” said Wendy.
She and her sister hardly broke a sweat this morning, even though the trail was slippery and wet. Rain had fallen late into the previous night.
If anything, it was the NST team that held them back today. Trying to keep our balance, we grabbed branches of trees and shrubs along the path, bringing great showers of water down upon ourselves.
I fell off the path and down the steep hillside in the dark. Photographer Datu Ruslan Sulai slipped in the mud and fell on the trail.
The girls, however, were surefooted and confident. They waited patiently for us to catch up each time they got ahead.
As the day brightened, they doused their bamboo torch and left it at one of two rest huts along the way.
The trail ends at the river, and Kampung Kibambangan is on the other side. An asphalt road starts there, leading to their school about 500m away.
Their father Jium Rampaya, who is in his 40s, came with them today to register them at school. But most days the girls would be on their own, he said.
Jium, who plants hill padi and taps rubber, knows education will bring his children better lives. He and wife Irene Molidon are prepared endure the hardship of putting them through school.
“It’s not easy living a life deep in the jungle, but what else can we do? I have thought of moving downhill to Putaton or Kampung Timpangoh but I would not know how to feed my family there,” he said.
The Kg Lutung children hardly miss a day of school, said their headmistress Bernadette Giluk Dompok.
“Attendance averages between 92 and 95 per cent. Given their surroundings, I would consider it good,” she said.
“They are also excused from additional classes on Saturdays. I prefer if they rest during the weekends.”
To make up for that, extra classes for tuition are sometimes held on weekdays.
The children have also benefited from the school’s supplementary food programme, Dompok said. “That is sometimes the only meal they have.”
Why do the girls make the daily struggle to get to school? Because their friends are there, they said.
For their cousin Jarina John, the pay-off is clearer. The 12-year-old, who lives in the same hamlet as the Jiums, wants to follow in her elder sister’s footsteps.
“It’s not easy but I wish to become like Liana someday,” she said.
Liana is now 21 and studying for a degree at Universiti Putra Malaysia in Serdang, Selangor.
Their father John Gunsit works as a cleaner at the Sabah Museum. It has not been easy keeping Liana in college, and he has help from his son Melvin, who works in a Shah Alam factory.
By the light of a kerosene lamp last night, Gunsit watched his daughter pack her schoolbooks and lay out her uniform in their humble wooden house.
“I hope Jarina can follow in her sister’s footsteps,” he said. “As a father, I will do all I can. But it all depends on her.”
