From Brick Factory Worker to Teacher

Dear friends, actually our life has always been very very hard. We are poor and my father works for his children’s schooling, it was common for us to have to ask for help from people just so we could eat. Our life is really terrible, sometimes we have money to go to school but there are many times when we don’t and we have to stay at home and work in the brick factory, perhaps if there was not the brick factory we would not have been able to go to school at all. It is the only thing that keeps us alive.

Mawardah working in awful conditions just to afford food and go to school

I remember before the Tsunami my father and mother worked so hard but we never had enough money for food, it was really terrible it makes me suffer just to remember again… sometimes I thought Allah, the Greatest gave us a terrible test and we could not pass it. We never had money in our hands. If someone took pity on us and helped us, we could not pay it back. Just to have a meal to maintain our life was such a difficult thing, but we just had to accept this was a test from Allah, the Greatest.

Our life has always been like that, we don’t have money often not even for rice yet alone other things. There are many times we don’t eat; we have had to ask too many people for help and can not repay them so we can not ask anyone for help again. We have nothing left in out house to sell for food, when the wall and roof collapsed there was nothing we could do… that is how we had to live.

Can you imagine our lives? Then on December 26th 2004 while our lives were like that a strong earthquake followed by the Tsunami that hit and destroyed Aceh. I was separated from my parents and family. I found my brother, Hanifullah and we were in the Tsunami together it took us so far away and we were trapped. There was nothing we could do, we were under debris and could not move. Fortunately a man came to release a goat and he got us out and ordered us to go too the nearest hill.

There we stayed without food, starving; the people wanted us to go as refugees to Cot Keueueng, but we stayed and eventually found my parents and my lovely sister Maqfirah. We held each other and cried, they thought my brother and I were dead.

We all went to Puteh Tangan village as refugees, during that time many earthquakes occurred and we were so scared another Tsunami would occur. During one of those earthquakes we were running to the hill for safety, there was a huge downpour of rain and I fell spraining my hand and my sister lacerated her arm, we didn’t know where to go.

Eventually we went to Cot Keueung and stayed in an emergency tent. Every day we faced new problems, one day a man tried to steal our very limited food supply. But maybe he did not receive any food aid there was so little in our area, it made us feel really sorry, we had a little rice and some salty fish but no soup or vegetables. We were devastated when we realized the power of the Tsunami and its destruction, most of my relatives died. We were not prepared to save our lives.

We stayed in that camp for three months, we had no house and nowhere else to go to. One day a woman whom I did not know came, she looked so good and asked me to take some clothes. This was the first time I was able to change since December 26th.

A few months pasted and with some other people we went back to our village. We worked together to clean it. There were so many bodies, we did not know what we should do with them. Eventually we decided to put them into the house that was not completely destroyed and cover them… it was all we were able to do.

When we returned to the camp we were told that we must accept the situation and it was suggested we all return to our villages and start to reconstruct it again. But our village was totally destroyed and there were very limited building materials that we could use. Finally a barrack was built as a shelter for us. We could stay there safe and I prayed that one day our lives would get better and not be so terrible.

And finally someday Samaritan’s purse gave us a house that we could stay and live in permanently.

A few years later, there was a woman who was so nice and spoke very politely … she was Miss Natascha, and I really like her very much. As I said before the tsunami I worked in the brick factory and I did again after the tsunami. Often I would get sick because of the conditions, but I did not have a choice. Then Miss Natascha opened a school for the children in our village. Miss Natascha is a very good woman, she worked with her heart and my mother said Miss Natascha is a good woman with her efforts she beings hope of a future to the children of the village. It has made us feel hopeful and taken away the feeling of hopelessness.

Mawardah attending our Learning Centre

Miss Natascha bought some computers and I followed the first computer training course, I passed and continued onto the second level. Then I started the touch typing course, after I had passed that Miss Natascha asked and invited me to be a touch typing and computer teacher for the computer school we now have in the village. My mother really appreciated the help and support Natascha has given me. It is like a dream come true … it seemed impossible for me to have a better life, to have an honorable job and a future beyond the brick factory. I used to feel so helpless and stupid. Alhamdulillah (thanks be to God), Miss Natascha changed my life, it is better and full of hope. It is amazing that I could go to computer school when we do not have enough money to eat many days.

Mawardah having an ‘honorable’ job

My friend can you imagine how terrible our lives were? How we suffered and did not have hope for a future? I really do not want to remember, how bad it was for a poor family like us, to be afraid to think of the future. Now I just do anything I can to improve my future. The one thing I want if there is the opportunity is to make a better life for myself and family. I want to make with my own effort, with my own power and hard work. I now have hope for the future, because I trust that if there is a will I will find the way and I will do my best to achieve that. I know my parents are not young any more and it is getting more difficult for them to earn money. I hope that one day I can take over their role. I pray for their health and mine as well as strength so that we can earn enough for our daily needs.

One thing I still remember is that I must still pay back the money to those that helped my family with food, I hope that sometime I will be able to do that.

For all of you, my life story so far has not been good; we did not have hope and to buy something new is just a dream. We work to eat if there is enough I go to school. We do not have anything … only a hope and a dream that God will grant me the possibility to improve my life and provide for my family.

This is my true life story.

Mawardah

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