Escape from hell?

I finally met up with Anita today to listen to her problems. She called me at 1 pm just as I left my office. Perfect timing. I told her to wait at the hospital's main entrance and look out for my Kenari. I had only met her once before, that was some time last year, and wasn't really sure if I'd be able to recognise her this time.

But as I got to the hospital, there she was, standing away from the others, making it easy for me to spot. So I told her to get into my car and we'd chat as I drove. We couldn't stop for lunch anyway, could we? :)

OK, so what are Anita's problems?

If you had followed Anita's story here, you'd know that Anita didn't have an IC due to some problems with her citizenship status. Just to recap for those too lazy to follow the link, Anita's mother was a Singaporean who married a Malaysian and eventually got a Malaysian citizenship. However, in Anita's birth cert, her mother's citizenship was indicated as Singaporean. Shouldn't be a problem if her father's a Malaysian, right? Well, Anita has a different father. An Indonesian. And so in Anita's BC, it was indicated that her father was Indonesian and mother Singaporean. That makes Anita a non-citizen. Her mother was in the process of doing all the necessary statutory declarations to correct Anita's BC, but before that was done, her mother died. Her father? Nobody seemed to know where he is. And the matter was left hanging just like that.

The last time we went to visit, we were told by the sister (with whom Anita is staying) that the sisters were willing to help - just tell them what to do. After finding out from JPN, my colleague informed Anita and her sister of the documents needed. We told them to inform us once they get all the documents ready.

Well, they never came back. So even to this date, Anita still doesn't have an IC, and her son, who is already 1 year old, still doesn't have a birth cert. It looked as though they weren't too concerned about getting the IC for Anita and the birth cert for her son.

My colleague went to visit her at home recently and found out there were other problems to it. Today, I found out what the problem was.

You see, the sister whom Anita is currently staying with, only pretended to be nice when we went to visit last year. She made it sound as though it was she and her hubby (or so I thought), a convert (or so I thought) who had been taking care of Anita all the while.

Hmmm... what's this with the "or so I thought"? Well, if what Anita told me is true, Anita's sister never married that guy and that guy never converted to Islam. They are just staying together, leading everyone (including the guy's mother) to believe they were married. They kept telling people that they had their akad nikah quietly without all the hassle of kenduri and what nots. And to date they don't have any children either, possibly planned that way.

That shouldn't be a problem to Anita anyway. Her problem is that she had been mentally tortured staying with them. Since she doesn't have an IC, it's difficult for her to get a job, so her sister arranged for her to do some work at home - assembling things for a factory and gets paid based on each finished product. She's paid about RM200 to RM250 a month for that.

BUT Anita doesn't have a single sen in hand. All the money for her work-at-home job is held by the sister who claims she's the one who has to take care of Anita and her baby. Oh, the sister's good at ungkit-mengungkit too. The only time when Anita gets to hold some money is when she needs to go to the hospital for her appointments - the sister would give her RM10.

There was also a time when the sister needed money and told Anita to borrow from any of us in Buddies under the pretext that it was for her baby. Anita refused.

Things get even worse...

The so-called sister's "hubby" at times would try to seduce Anita when the sister's not around (Oh he knows Anita has HIV! He couldn't care less). But when Anita's sister comes home, she accuses Anita of trying to seduce her "hubby".

And since this guy eats pork, sometimes he'd force some of the meat into the mouth of Anita's son.

Of late, the sister has also been finding faults with Anita; calling her b*bi, p***mak, pembawa penyakit and a whole load of sh*t. At times she'd even tell Anita and her baby to berambus. But despite telling Anita to berambus, the sister actually controls Anita's movements. If she finds out that Anita has been talking to anyone, Anita would get a scolding. That's why she makes sure Anita doesn't have a single sen in her hand.

And here's another reason (I think) why Anita's sisters don't seem to like Anita. Anita's mother never legally married Anita's father. Aiyo! All these kawin tapi tak nikah runs in the family or whaaat? To the sisters, since Anita is an "illegal" child, they are not legally adik-beradik.

I told Anita even under Islamic law, they are still siblings by virtue of sharing the same mother. It doesn't matter if Anita was born out of wedlock.

So, now Anita wants to run away from her sister's house. She's seeking help since she doesn't have a single sen. Before she called me today she even went to see the hospital's welfare officer. The officer told her about the possibility of trying to stay at the shelter home where Sharifah was sent to (Kak Ana's place). When Anita told the officer that she'd be seeing me after that, the officer told her to discuss things over with me first.

Whatever it is, no matter where we end up sending Anita, we'd need to settle her IC and her son's birth cert problem. Without an IC, it's hard for Anita to get a job, and without a job, how was she to feed her child? Anita would need to get at least one of her sister's birth cert which indicates that their mother was a Malaysian citizen.

According to Anita, there is one sister who is more of the "boleh bawa berunding" type who would give a copy of her birth cert to be used as supporting document. But this sister stays in another state down south, and she doesn't know about Anita's HIV status. She had promised many times she'd send over the copy of her birth cert, but never got around to doing it. I asked Anita if she'd be able to get it if she went personally to that sister's house.

"Boleh tu memanglah boleh, tapi macam mana saya nak pergi rumah dia? Saya mana ada duit nak bayar tambang bas."

So I offered to buy her the bus ticket. We'd need to settle this IC and birth cert problem ASAP before things get even more berbelit-belit!

To avoid interrogation, Anita is not telling her sister here that she's going to the other sister's house to get the copy of birth cert.

And her plan is, she will leave when the sister and her so-called hubby are at work. And when she leaves the house to go to the other sister's house, she's leaving for good. When she comes back with the copy of the other sister's birth cert and IC, she intends to go straight to any shelter homes that would accept her.

I called up Kak Ana and she's willing to accept Anita and her baby.

So now to plan for Anita's "escape from hell".

Can anyone help?

I was relaxing at home on Tuesday when SN called me. She was at the HIV clinic then, giving some counseling to a newly diagnosed HIV positive guy. SN wouldn't call me unless she has a favour to ask or a client to refer.

True enough, SN asked if I'd be on clinic duty the next day as there was one particular case she wanted to specifically pass to me. Well, my next clinic duty will be in mid-April and so, that Wednesday (yesterday) the clinic duty was attended by my colleagues.

According to SN, this guy, Aman, a Muslim convert, needs a place to stay. His parents are no longer around, and he's been staying at an aunt's house, (the aunt knows he's a Muslim) but when the aunt found out about his HIV status, she wanted him to move out. She said she'd be coming back in a week's time and she wants him out by then.

Aman used to work at a food court, but ever since he got sick (he found out about his HIV when he was hospitalized recently) he's no longer working. Now that he needs to move out of his aunt's house, and without earning any income, how on earth is he supposed to support himself? And where on earth is he supposed to live? Not only does he need  shelter and moral support, being a new Muslim, he also needs religious guidance.

And so that was why SN decided to call me. I already had other appointments in my office on Wednesday, otherwise I wouldn't mind dropping by the hospital for a while to meet up with this guy. I told SN to just refer him to my colleagues who were on duty so they could take down his details. I trust my colleagues would still refer the case to me.

Just as I had expected, while I was at my office yesterday morning, my colleague who was on clinic duty called to inform me about this guy. I already had some basic info about Aman from SN, so my colleague didn't have to explain much. But I couldn't give an answer there and then as I still need to ask around on where would be the best place to refer this guy to. Only problem was, he doesn't have a phone, and he's about to be chased out of his aunt's house, so how was I supposed to contact him? I had no choice but to tell my colleague to tell Aman to call me in 2 or 3 days time, with the hope that I'd be able to come up with a solution by then.

Meanwhile I've been surfing the web, searching for homes that may accept people like Aman. I know of some shelter homes for HIV+ men, but the ones which would probably give some Islamic guidance are the ones specifically for drug/substance users - and according to what I've been told, Aman is not. His HIV infection was probably due to his bad past. There are a few other shelter homes for HIV positive men, but they are either Christian or Buddhist homes. Yes, there are some homes which are not religion based, but Aman needs religious guidance as well. Yes, there are many Muslim shelter homes - but all for either women or children. For men? Ahh, the old folks homes... but Aman definitely doesn't qualify.

I was browsing the website of a particular Muslim dakwah and charity organisation. I figured this organisation would be the best organisation to help Muslim converts. I just tried my luck by sending in my query - telling them of Aman's situation and asking if the organisation is able to help. When I checked this morning, there was already a response to my query, asking me for Aman's or my phone number. Alhamdulillah... there's hope, I thought. So I quickly replied, saying that Aman doesn't have a phone but is supposed to call me back in 2 or 3 days time. So I gave them my phone number. Again, there was another quick response, telling me that someone will call me. I became even more hopeful.

Before noon, a lady from the said organisation called. I was expecting her to maybe ask for further details and then suggesting to me where I should refer this guy to. But instead the lady said they didn't have the sources for this kind of cases for men, and so she suggested that I refer this case to JKM instead. Aduh, my hopes were dashed! If an organisation supposedly doing dakwah work can't help me out on this one, who can?

Aman still hasn't called me yet. Frankly I'm not sure if I can come up with a solution by the time he calls. I guess the most important thing is for him to get some shelter, so I guess all I can do for the time being is to give him the options of the various shelter homes for HIV positive men.

Aman may be rather weak and fragile at the moment, but if given proper care and guidance, I believe he can get better. And when he does get better, he should be able to work again. But if he becomes homeless and doesn't get any proper care, his condition will only worsen. And probably, so will his faith, na'uzubillah.

Ya Allah, help him please.