What is the distance between Sandakan, a city in Sabah on the north-eastern coast of Borneo, and southern Philippines? Doubtless the answer can be expressed in a certain number of kilometres. But for about a million people, the most pertinent answer is – or rather, was – a night’s island-hopping journey in a small boat. These people left their homes in the Philippine south to escape poverty and now reside unofficially in Sandakan.
Goducate’s work in Sandakan revolves around two schools (for the teaching of English and mathematics) that it has set up in two separate kampung communities of the southern Philippine undocumented immigrants. The older of the two schools started with an enrolment of sixty children; today, it serves three hundred. The newer school has over a hundred children under its wing.
(Children waiting eagerly for their turn to perform on stage)
Despite my not having had any prior involvement with Goducate, I am part of a team that touched down in Sandakan at 8pm on Friday, the fifth day of February 2010. We were scheduled to depart at 10.30am on Sunday, leaving just Saturday for the fulfilment of the purposes for which we have made the visit, namely: to study firsthand the progress that Goducate field workers have made in the schools, to discuss with them what needs remain and what visionary goals should be aimed for, and to hand over a van which will be used for ferrying the schoolchildren around Sandakan (this arrangement being necessary because public transport is out of bounds without proper papers and documentation).
(Two boys standing outside the Goducate Community Center)
Following an early wake-up call and a hearty breakfast by the sea, we arrive at the older of Goducate’s two schools at around 8.30am on Saturday. Here, the closest thing to a dedicated school building is a garage belonging to one of the wealthier kampung residents. It is not large enough to accommodate all the students, so classes are also conducted in the homes of residents who have generously volunteered the use of their own limited living space. We move from class to class, stopping all-too-briefly at each to observe the lessons, and then we are treated to a programme consisting mainly of performances put up by the children.
We leave at 11am or so, take lunch, and make our way thereafter to the newer school. Parking our vehicles on a quiet suburban street flanked on one side by semi-detached houses, we proceed to a dirt track leading off from the street and walk twenty minutes through the forest until we come to the zinc-roofed shed where classes are usually conducted. Today, this shed is the venue for a programme that has been prepared for us; like the morning’s programme at the other school, it consists mainly of performances put up by the children. By 3.30pm we are back at the street where our vehicles are parked.
I am struck, as anyone would be, by the eagerness with which the children learn, and the seriousness with which they take their work. Remember that physical conditions are hardly optimum: the classrooms are so small and cramped that there is barely enough space for an aisle in between the tables (which reach no higher than my calf); the children sit or kneel on the floor; there is, on average, one teacher to approximately sixty students. Yet they take such painstaking care in practising their penmanship! How heartening, how edifying, to behold the studious concentration on their faces as their pencils eke out the lowercase letters of the English alphabet – one by one, slowly but surely.
(Children in uniform donated by a Singapore kindergarten)
It is impossible not to be filled with warmth and affection when interacting with the children; it is impossible not to believe in the urgent necessity of giving them a good education. It is impossible when you hear them chorus, in earnest children’s voices, “Good morning, teachers!” followed by a tentative “Good morning, classmates” that trails off and fades in slight embarrassment. It is impossible when they congregate in front of you and your fellow audience members and sing simple songs about the alphabet or the colours of the rainbow with wide-eyed, smiling gusto. It is impossible when they all clamour to take your hand; when they touch your hand respectfully to their foreheads; when they touch their chests after they have released your hand. In short, it is impossible not to love them.
But cynicism is never far away, at least for me, I regret to say. There is that part of me which reacts with scepticism, which responds: “Sure, you might be convinced now of the need to educate these children, but that’s only because they’re so adorable.” That may be true, but if one cannot even help those whom it is easy to love, how is one ever going to help those who are less loveable, who may even be unloveable?
And in any case all cynicism disappears once I listen to the stories of the leaders of the work in Sandakan. They hail from the Philippines – there is Linn, the lady who started it all. Bam and Jean were both compelled to follow after listening to Linn share her experiences in a church one evening.
As we sit in a circle in the semi-detached house that serves as the Goducate dormitory and office, they tell us their stories. Linn tells us that her husband is working in Kuala Lumpur and her children are in Manila, and describes her struggles with loneliness. She tells us about a boy from the older kampung school who went on to a private school in the city and topped his class. She tells us about another boy who only that day came in first in a drawing competition.
Bam and Jean tell us about the fears that they had when they first came to Sandakan, how they assumed that every Muslim was a terrorist because of their experience with the Abu Sayyaf back home. They narrate the dramatic tale of how they just managed to catch the last bus of the day to Sandakan from Kota Kinabalu the first time that they came. They tell us how comfortable it was going back to the Philippines from Sandakan, how they began to be unsure whether or not to return to Sandakan, how they wrestled with and finally overcame those doubts. Bam tells us how, with her mother working overseas, she only had her first Christmas dinner with her entire family present at the age of twenty-four.
(Goducate volunteer teacher in action)
As Linn, Bam and Jean tell us their stories, they are overcome with emotion. They must pause every now and then to wipe away the tears in their eyes – sometimes tears of pride, triumph and joy, sometimes tears of remembered guilt, pain and lack of faith. They show such humbling humility that they do all they can to deflect credit from themselves, insisting instead on praising their fellow workers. In the waning light of late afternoon, we listen in complete silence, unspeakably moved by the depths of their devotion and sacrifice.
Nor can I forget all the other people labouring for the undocumented immigrants of Sandakan. There are the teachers in the schools, who get by on just RM300 a month, patiently nurturing every child under their tutelage. There is Jun, from the Philippines – he has only been in Sandakan five days, and his visa expires by the end of the month, but he is determined to stay. There is John and his wife Flor, Chinese Sandakan residents, willing to drop everything to show visitors around and introduce them to the best food that the city has to offer – he unceasingly jovial, cheerful and passionate; she always there to lend a helping and comforting hand.
It is easy to be cynical from afar. It is easy to be cynical when ensconced in the material plenty and familiar security of Singapore, removed from the everyday tribulations of those less blessed. But no heart can stay hardened when bathed in the soft, warm light of sincere, caring love and sacrificial devotion such as that demonstrated by these dear people and all the humble servants in the kampungs whose names I do not yet know.
On Sunday, Linn, Bam and Jean travel with us to where we are to have breakfast before we head for the airport, but they have duties to perform elsewhere and are unable to have a meal with us. We exchange e-mail contacts, take photographs and say our farewells, and then the three of them get into a waiting taxi. I am told that, as the taxi drove off, Linn pulled out a big handkerchief and wiped her eyes with it. I did not notice. Perhaps it was because I was too focused on preventing tears from welling up in my own eyes
I asked permission to come into the house and saw that they were cleaning bird’s nest. Sabah is the home of a famous Chinese delicacy – the nest of a species of birds, the swifts. Swifts (a relative of the swallow) make their nests from their salivary secretions. They build their nests in the walls of limestone caves. The Sabah government issues licenses to gather these nests. When first harvested from caves, these nests are covered with filth and feathers. These 3 teenagers were busy cleaning these nests with tooth-brushes and fine tweezers.
It takes about 2 hours to remove hundreds of little black “dots” of dirt that are somewhat embedded in the white nest substance. For their effort they get 3 Malaysian dollars (less than US $1) for each nest that they clean. This is a good salary in this village. And the three teenagers are proud to have a choice job in the biggest factory in that village!
