The journey to Kg Pinompok from Membakut Jaya on 27 June was uneventful. It is about 6.9 km from BSN Membakut Jaya branch which was the agreed rendezvous point with my guests from Kota Kinabalu whom wanted to pay Rina Alan's family a visit. Our NGO Beyond Pitas in collaboration with Hanafundme decided that we should assess Rina's situation to ascertain whether her children are in need of any assistance with regard to online learning.
A team of volunteers consisting of Photo Journalist, Intern journalist and off road enthusiast was despatched from Kota Kinabalu and I volunteered to be their guide.
As I was saying, it was uneventful as we drove past vast oil palm plantations. Drove on gravel roads which intermittenly switched to asphalt roads.
The only time we were challenged was when we were only about 50 metres away from their house. A rubber tree has fallen and it was blocking our path.
And we reached our destination.
Their house is perched on the ledge of a hill. When we reached there, Rina was in the midst of tapping a rubber tree. So we asked her permission to take pictures of her while she finishes her chore.
Rina Alan, 35 years old is an unemployed single mother of 2 surviving children. Her second daughter passed away on 6 April 2019 due to an infection to her heart. Her surviving children are Rachel Avella Lee, 13 and Maxwell Lee, 11.
Few years ago she took her 3 children back with her to live with her parents in Kg Pinopok, Membakut from Kota Kinabalu when her husband passed away. Few years later, her second child suddenly passed away as mentioned above.
The villagers all share a common water source, that is a gravity fed water source from uphill. At the time, many villagers fell ill. Mostly down with diarrhea but Rina's daughter took the brunt of it. She developed high fever and was referred to the Children's Hospital in Likas, Kota Kinabalu. She succumbed to her infection a few days after her admission.
It was serious enough that the hospital alerted the local health authority in nearby Beaufort to send a team to investigate the outbreak. They suspected their water source was contaminated.
Any ordinary person with less mettle would had question their lot in life and succumb to despair but Rina prevailed for her remaining children even when life has already dealt her a series of unfortunate events.
Rina support her children by tapping rubber and occasionally sells her vegetable produce in the market. A far cry from her previous live in the city.
Now I have met her son Maxwell once before when I happened to pass by her stall in Membakut. Seemed to be a well adjusted and sensible boy but I had never met Rachel before or Ting Ting as she is affectionately called by her family and the villagers.
Other than knowing that she is a Thalassemia patient, I know nothing of her. I didn't even have an indepth knowledge of the disease and how it affects people. So when I saw Ting Ting, I asked what anyone would ordinarily ask, 'How old are you and what primary class are you in?'.
Rina immediately replied on her behalf as Ting Ting seemed to have no interest to dignify that question.
'She should be in form 2 now.' Rina said.
Oh boy! At that instance, I regretted my erroneous assumption. I stole a glance at Ting Ting and from her eyes - I imagined tiny darts to be shooting in my way. There seemed to be a slight annoyance in her demure expression.
I don' t blame her if she took offence from my dumb question. It must get tiresome having strangers constantly mistaking your age and I might had reminded her for the umpteenth time that she is different from other kids her age which in my defence, was never my intention.
Ting Ting, if you have the pleasure of meeting her in person is a delicate little flower. Demure and a pretty child.
Thalessemia, which I regrettably only learned now - causes growth of a child to be stunted. So Ting Ting looks younger than her age.
Ting Ting needs regular blood transfusion of type B+ blood. At least twice a month in Likas Hospital which is about 90 odd km away from Membakut. This put much strain on Rina's subsistence income. During the height of the Covid19 pandemic, blood stock ran low.
Ting Ting suffered much during that period. Although the hospital did give her O+ blood as a stopgap measure, it was not optimum enough to keep her Hemaglobin (Hgb) count above 11, the optimum reading is 13. It only managed to scrap a count of 9 reading.
When Ting Ting's Hgb count is low, she would be in a constant state of exhaustion and her kidneys would be in pain. So she suffered much during the Movement Control Order (MCO) as donors stopped donating blood.
Ting Ting stopped going to school last year, a few weeks after her younger sister passed away suddenly. She developed Nephrotic Syndrome which only exarcebates her condition. Nephrotic causes protein to be leached from her body through her urine.
Her daily routine now is to take her cocktail of medicines in the morning and then help her mother do house chores. 5 times a week in the evening, she will administer an injection on herself for 6 hours to eliminate excess iron buildup from her body.
To while her time away as she is not schooling now, she will watch YouTube and read blogs. Ting Ting's favourite subject in school was Science before she was robbed of her place in the education system by the disease.
However, Ting Ting still harbours hope of a bright future. Her ambition is to open a bakery and be an advocate for Thalassemia patients like herself. She wants to learn bakery, make cakes and start a blog to write about the disease and her experience. That is lofty for a 13 year old. Commendable, no doubt driven by her personal suffering.
We have not forgotten about Maxwell or Max. That little 11 year old boy whom at first was too shy to meet us. Opting to stay in the background and observed while we showered attention to his eldest sister.
Max wants to be a policeman when he grows up. To protect and serve. One thing you will notice if you observe enough, Max has the expression of an old soul.
It's like he couldn't wait to grow up so that he could help his mom.
The weight of the family's future is resting on his young shoulders.
It will get better Max.
Please help Hanafundme and Beyond Pitas to bring hope to children like them by donating to this campaign.
Lastly, on behalf of Beyond Pitas team and Angie Chin-Tan for Hanafundme, I would like to thank Sabahannewsonline for publishing this.
Yours sincerely,
Justin Sunam Wong
Co Founder, Beyond Pitas
*all pictures are credited to ImranMJ and Eric Ye with thanks.
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