Lin's story

As mentioned in my previous posting on 2007 recap, I didn’t include Lin as a new client in 2007 as she just contacted me at the end of year and I had yet to meet her. I also said that Lin would probably be my first client for 2008.

Well, true enough Lin is my first client of this year.

While I was in my office this morning, Lin sent me a text message, asking if she could meet me today. Initially we planned to meet next week when she comes to Ipoh for her blood test. But Lin just got herself a job (as a shop assistant) and her off days are on Wednesdays, so she may not have the time to meet up with me when she comes next week.

Since my office work is on a half day basis, I agreed to meet up with her after 2.30 pm. I told her to call me when she reaches the bus station so I could fetch her there. I also gave her my car registration number so she could look out for me. We have never met each other before so we don’t know how each other look like. I will have to depend on her to give me the signal when she sees my car.

Right after I gave the details (where & when to meet) via SMS to Lin, another text message came in. I thought it was Lin again confirming that the arrangement was okay with her. But when I read the message, it actually came from Yah. She wanted to tell me that she has to pay Abang Chik’s schooling needs herself. I replied her SMS telling her to pay first and then give me all the details so I could arrange for reimbursement. Unless she has finished all her EPF money on unnecessary things (like karaoke maybe??); she should be able to pay first. I don’t want my clients to think of me as their banker who’d simply give them money as per their request anytime.

What a coincidence that Yah’s SMS came right after Lin’s. Macam tau-tau they’re now both the main stars in Pi’s Twist… :)

I had estimated that Lin would reach the bus station about 3 pm. As I was driving just a few minutes away from the bus station, Lin called to say she was already at the bus station. Told her to wait at Medan Kidd across the road so it would be easier for her to look out for me, and for me to look out for a person who looks like she’s looking out for me… (ah, Pi with her typical twist!)

I then took her to a food stall so we could minum-minum and makan-makan while we talk.

Lin is a very pleasant person to talk to. Although in her first SMS to me she said she felt depressed, I think all she needed was someone to talk to. She looked relieved having had the opportunity to talk to me. She was not shy to talk about herself and I didn’t really have to dig for details. She just talked without hiding anything.

With the details given, I was doubly sure that her ex-husband is indeed Mr. Darling (yes, EX husband. They are divorced). And I got to know of Mr. Darling’s dirty little secrets since during his early marriage days. He had actually started going out having fun ever since the couple had 2 kids. Sometimes he didn’t come home for 3 nights without telling. Many times he’d come home at 3 or 4 am; smelling of alcohol and with lipstick marks on his shirt. There was once when Mr. Darling was caught red-handed in a lorry with another lady – by the lady’s family members. They threatened to report him to the authorities. Mr. Darling came home, admitted to Lin what he did, and had the cheek to ask Lin to say he was with her at home if anybody comes to investigate. As someone who never worked before and always dependent on the husband, Lin stayed on as a very obedient wife, taken advantage by the husband.

Now they have six children, and I must say I am impressed with the children’s academic performance. Her eldest daughter has just been called for an interview to further her studies at a nursing college, her 2nd daughter who used to go to a boarding school, is now overseas under a scholarship. She’s taking up medic. The 3rd daughter is waiting for her SPM results. This daughter too used to go to a boarding school but she couldn’t last long there and so went back to a daily school.

Her younger 3 children are the ones who need help for their educational needs. Their father gives them money from time to time but just enough for their daily basic needs, definitely not enough for their schooling needs. Knowing that her 2nd daughter (the one on scholarship) just got reimbursed with RM1,500 for her earlier preparation to go overseas, he told her to use that money for the schooling needs of the other children. Whaddaheck… he spends his money on women and liquor, and then wants to use his daughter’s hard earned scholarship money to be spent on the other children’s educational needs?!

And how did Mr. Darling and Lin get divorced? Lin - being lonely and seldom going out of the house, used to send text messages to her friends. Mr. Darling, not wanting his “hal ehwal rumahtangga” to be known to anyone else, told her that if she sent out ANY SMS to simply ANYONE on ANY subject, consider it as “jatuh talak”.

By then Lin actually could not take it anymore. Having been infected with HIV despite being a very obedient wife who seldom goes out, Lin simply has had it with Mr. Darling! She wanted a divorce. So she sent one SMS to a friend of hers. After that she asked Mr. Darling if he meant what he said earlier and told him about the SMS she sent. Mr. Darling then said, “Kalau macam tu kira dah jatuhlah talak.”

When the matter was brought to the Pejabat Agama, Lin had it easy because Mr. Darling admitted everything without much fuss. Truth is, if he refused to admit that he had divorced Lin, Lin would have probably brought up the HIV issue and he didn’t want the Pejabat Agama people to know about his HIV status and his extra-marital activities.

However, during the last Raya season, Mr. Darling did try to use his children to coax their mother to remarry him. His reason… “sayang nanti kalau abah kawin lain, pencen abah dapat kat bini baru.” Hmmm… didn’t he use the same pencen issue to coax Yah to marry him? I remember him telling Yah he wanted his pension to go to Yah instead of to his wife who left him. What? He thinks women are so hard up for his pencen, ah? Cheh!

Lin of course refused. She had had enough of him taking advantage of her.

Funny thing was, just about a week or so after he told his children to coax their mother to remarry him, the eldest daughter saw him in town with another lady in the car. Hmmm… remember Yah spending the night at his mother’s house after our Deepa-Raya do? Judging from the timing, I am quite confident the lady the daughter saw was actually our dear Yah Ah Ngau! Muahaha!!

Anyway, I promised Lin I will try to arrange for some education funds for her schooling children. Lin said once she gets all the details she’d SMS everything to me.

Just as I got home after sending Lin back to the bus-station, another SMS came in on my handphone. It was Yah again, repeating the same thing – that she has to pay for Abang Chik’s schooling needs herself. Didn’t she understand me the first time? I replied using the same answer, only this time, I added one more line – “Duit EPF hari tu dah habis ke?” I just asked her to pay first. I didn't say she won't get any help. Well, no replies yet so far.

When she first got her EPF money, she did say she’d keep some for her children’s needs. But then, when she got her EPF, she had not met Mr. Darling… she had not started karaoke-ing… and she had not been spending her nights at her friends' homes out of town, usually traveling by taxi instead of taking the bus...

Adoii… the 3 main characters in my mollywood movie now…

YAH… LIN… and DAH-LING…

Rashid's hospital appointment and Zana's new job

Just when I thought there’d probably be no more contacts with my PLWHA clients this week after having sent all the cash donations and Raya goodies to them, yesterday morning just as I was about to leave for work, Rashid’s wife called.

Rashid needs to go for his hospital appointment tomorrow in Ipoh but he is too weak to even get up. The last appointment he went to, although he was quite weak, he could at least get up to walk to the taxi we arranged for him. This time he’s already bedridden and so someone would need to carry him down from his house to whatever transportation arranged for him. Other than their 3 small kids, only Rashid’s wife and her mom stay in that house. So, who’s going to help carry Rashid down from his house? (They stay in a kampong house.) Even if I were to go all the way to their house (not in Ipoh), I don’t think I’d be able to help carry him. Hospital ambulance? They'd only go for emergency cases. Appointments cannot be considered emergency.

Rashid’s wife didn’t know what else to do. She called the ID clinic to seek help (thinking maybe the nurse could arrange for an ambulance to come) but was told by the nurse to make her own arrangements to bring him for his appointment. Well… the nurse has many other things to do and so arranging the patients’ transportation is definitely not part of her job.

The problem is, when these patients miss their appointments, they always get scolded for not sticking to their appointments. It didn’t matter what excuses were given. They are always accused of being irresponsible and troublesome.

Well, yes I admit, there are irresponsible and troublesome patients who come as and when they like… non-compliant with their appointments and medication etc. But then there are also genuine cases like Rashid – too weak to walk and too poor to arrange for other transport -- who may miss his appointments not because he’s too lazy to come but because he’s bedridden and his wife doesn’t know who to seek help from (oh, with Rashid’s condition… forget neighbours!).

Their house is too far from Ipoh for me to go personally (not that I’d be able to help much even if I do) so I gave Rashid’s wife a few phone numbers to call to seek help from. So far she hasn’t called me again so I hope she has found a way to bring Rashid for his appointment.

On another note, Kak Hawa, the lady in charge of the shelter home where I sent Zana (her earlier stories here: part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4) sent me a text message telling me that Zana has started working as a security guard at a flat and she’s now renting a room nearby. And while she’s at work, the landlady takes care of her baby. Alhamdulillah, good news at last! I hope Zana will not bring any trouble to her new landlady. She’d better start thinking of her future and more importantly, her child’s future.

The troubles the already troubled have to go through...

Remember I mentioned earlier that Yah wanted to withdraw her EPF to buy a piece of land and a house she can call her own home so that she need not worry about being chased out again by the present landlord?

And in one of my earlier postings titled “When the poor need help”, I also mentioned the kind of troubles the poor need to go through to get help… even in withdrawing their own money?

Let’s see what Yah has to go through in withdrawing her EPF money…

First and foremost, when withdrawing EPF under permanent disability, a medical report needs to be produced. Since Yah’s checkups and follow-ups are all done at the GH, all she needed to do was to get a copy of her medical report from the hospital. Just go to the medical records unit and apply for the report. Within a month, if there are no complications, they will post the report to you.

Sounds easy? Well, for the average person, maybe so. But for the poor where even a single sen matters, it’s not that easy. To get the medical report, a fee of RM40 needs to be paid to get a medical officer signing the report, or RM80 if you want a specialist to sign it. If a report is signed by a specialist, then when the medical report is submitted to the EPF, the applicant need not go to any panel clinics appointed by EPF. Since Yah could not afford to pay RM80, she opted for the report to be signed by an MO – even then the RM40 was already a substantial amount for her.

When I left Yah at the EPF office on the day of my last clinic duty (after she received the medical report from the hospital), I had already briefed her on what to expect. I told her that EPF would request her to go to 2 of EPF’s panel clinic to confirm the medical report that she submitted with her EPF withdrawal application. I advised her to specifically ask the EPF officers to let her do her medical checkup at any panel clinics located in northern Perak so that Yah wouldn’t have to travel so far.

Just about 2 weeks before that, when I brought Ani to EPF office for the same purpose, she was told to go to a private clinic in Ipoh while the other panel clinic was Pusat Kesihatan UTP, within UTP’s compounds. I thought that since Ani stays in a nearby town, that was why she was sent to UTP.

Much to my surprise, when Yah showed me her letters, she was supposed to go to the 2 same panel clinics that Ani was sent to. I asked why she didn’t ask for a nearer clinic. Yah said she already did, but the EPF officer told her they didn’t have any nearer clinic, the 2 clinics were all they could offer.

Seriously, EPF is such a big organization… surely they’d have panel clinics all over the state? The fact that the applicants had to submit medical reports already indicate they have medical problems. To add to that most of these applicants (or at least those whom I’m helping out) are from poor families. Although they don’t have to pay any fee to the panel clinics, traveling still requires money! I can understand EPF’s need to confirm the medical reports submitted by asking the applicants to go to EPF’s appointed panel clinics, but why trouble them by asking them to travel so far to get that done?

Yah was worried even about finding the clinic in Ipoh. The only places she’s familiar with in Ipoh are the bus station and the hospital. But I told her not to worry about the clinic in Ipoh as I knew the place and I’d take her there.

Just to come to Ipoh, Yah needs to take 3 buses at least: One from her kampong to the nearest town… then from that town to a bigger town… and finally from the bigger town to Ipoh. Asking her to go all the way to UTP would mean she’d have to take another bus to a town she was not familiar with. She doesn’t even know what bus to take. Okay, she can ask around, but the bus would stop right outside UTP. We’re talking about a university here… can you imagine how far she’d have to walk in to get to the clinic?

The letters given by EPF indicated that she was supposed to go to the clinics last Thursday. After giving it much consideration, I didn’t have the heart to let her go to UTP on her own. So when she called me saying that she was already at the Ipoh bus station, I immediately called the clinic in UTP to confirm that the doctor was in. Ani had told me earlier that she had to go twice because the first time she went the doctor was not in. The lady who answered the call said the doctor was in.

So after I fetched Yah at the bus station, I immediately drove her to UTP. When we got to the clinic and showed the EPF letter to the reception, we were told they had not received the letter from EPF (EPF is supposed to send letters direct to the clinic where the applicants are sent to) and therefore were unable to confirm her medical report as they had no idea what Yah’s reported ailments were and they were supposed to confirm Yah’s health condition on a specific form provided by EPF. They said maybe the letter from EPF had already reached UTP’s admin, but the letter had not reached the clinic. When the clinic assistants found out that Yah had to come all the way from Northern Perak, they were sympathetic and tried to help. They said they’d try to call their admin office and ask the people there to send the EPF letter (if any) to the clinic, but they didn’t dare confirm that it would be there by afternoon or even the next day. Were we supposed to wait there for something that wasn’t even confirmed?

I decided not to wait. Yah had another clinic to go to so I drove her back to Ipoh to send her to the other panel clinic. Not much problem at this clinic. Everything was done fast. I then took Yah for lunch before sending her to the bus station. She asked if she should come back on Monday, but I told her to wait for my call. I will have to call the clinic first, ask them if the letter is ready AND ask them if the doctor would be in. Then only I’ll tell Yah to come.

Came Monday, I called the UTP clinic, and again I was told they have not received the letter from EPF. No point asking Yah to come. It will be a waste of time, money and energy. The girl at the clinic took down my number and promised to call me once she gets any news. This morning the girl from the clinic called me. She told me that even UTP admin confirmed that they HAD NOT received any letters from EPF on Yah’s matter and therefore even if I brought Yah there today, they would still not be able to help. Yah will have no choice but to go back to EPF.

So I called Yah, told her to go to EPF and explain the whole matter to them and if possible, to appeal to them to let her go to another panel clinic in Ipoh so that she wouldn’t have to go all the way back to UTP.

I still don’t understand why the EPF officer decided to send Yah all the way to UTP to do her checkup. Was it really necessary to get Yah to travel more than 150 kms away from her house to confirm her medical report when there are so many other clinics to choose from?

I feel like asking the officers for the reasons behind their decision but I can already imagine their reaction, “Awak ni siapa?” (Oh yes, I’ve received that kind of reaction before! Probably some people think I’m one of those scumbags who take advantage of unsuspecting poor victims.) And chances are they’d give the same answer given to Yah… that there is no nearer clinic. They can fool Yah but please… EPF can only offer 2 panel clinics in the whole of Perak? I know for a fact there are other panel clinics in Ipoh. The least they could have done was to get Yah to do both her checkups in Ipoh… at least she didn’t have to travel from one town to another town. And in this case, due to the inefficiency, not only did she have to travel so far; she traveled so far for nothing. She could have used the money to buy food and other household necessities.

As I mentioned earlier, all Yah wants to do is withdraw HER OWN MONEY so she can buy a small piece of land and an old house she can call her own. She doesn’t want to worry about the prospect of being chased out by the present landlord again…

An aunt of Yah’s has indicated that she wants to sell off her piece of land (with an old house already built on it) within the same kampong that Yah is staying in now. Yah had indicated to her aunt that she wants to buy it from her once she gets her EPF money. Hopefully Yah can get her money before the aunt decides to sell to someone else. At least if she can stay in the same kampong she doesn’t have to worry about transferring her children to another school.

On a lighter note, the doctor at the panel clinic in Ipoh (the one Yah had already gone to) told Yah that there should be no problem getting her application approved. The only hiccup now is to get over one more panel clinic. Hopefully the next time Yah comes down everything will be settled. I dread the possibility of the poor woman having to travel up and down a few more times without getting any conclusive results...

Update 1st August 2007:

Yah went to the EPF office today and did as I told her to do - explain about the problem at UTP clinic and to appeal for the 2nd panel clinic to be in Ipoh. The EPF officer actually had a few options and finally told her to go to panel clinic in Ipoh town. I took her there this afternoon and everything is now settled. If only they had given her that clinic or any other Ipoh clinic in the first place things would have been much easier for Yah...