Having lost his job due to the pandemic, Myanmar refugee Mohd Rafik bin Md Ilyas scrapes by on scavenging. His family was evicted from their rented house as he was three months in rent arrears. To compound matters, his wife was due to deliver their baby and they desperately needed a place to settle down…
Twenty-six-year-old Myanmar refugee Mohd Rafik bin Md Ilyas (Rafik) was born and raised in Malaysia. He learnt about the Covid-19 Emergency Response—a cash-based intervention (CBI) programme jointly run by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and Tzu Chi—from a friend, who then assisted him with the application.
When Tzu Chi volunteer Yee Siew Fun contacted him on June 25, 2021, for a tele-assessment, he told her about his predicament—how he and his wife, Siti Nafisah, who was due to deliver on July 2, were forced to leave their rented house in mid-June, as they were unable to meet rental payments for three consecutive months since April.
Fortunately, Siti Nafisah’s sister was able to accommodate Siti Nafisah for a few days with permission from her landlord. Rafik, however, could only sleep by the staircase after 10 p.m., and hurriedly leave at the break of dawn the following day.
Their dire straits, especially with the impending childbirth a week later, prompted Siew Fun to quickly write and submit a report to the Tzu Chi KL & Selangor office.
◎ Human warmth amidst the pandemic
Soon after, Rafik’s application was approved. When Siew Fun contacted Rafik again on June 30 to break the good news to him, she learnt that Siti Nafisah had experienced a bloody show. She and fellow volunteers, Ting Fong Chuan and Goh Hun Beng, immediately delivered the cash assistance to Rafik to ease his financial worries.
Upon the volunteers’ arrival, Rafik was seen waiting for them. He looked nervous and his body was trembling. As it turned out, he went to his sister-in-law’s place but could not find his wife. He feared that he could not afford the medical expenses if his sister-in-law had taken his wife to a hospital. Thankfully, he managed to contact his sister-in-law and was relieved to know that his wife was with a home midwife whom they had earlier got acquainted with. Aware of his worries, the volunteers respectfully handed him the RM600 cash assistance from UNHCR before continuing their conversation.
Rafik shared that he had left home to live on his own since he was 12 years old, and had taken on various jobs like dishwashing, food preparation and construction work. His marriage in 2016 ended in a divorce due to dissatisfaction from his then parents-in-law. Subsequently, he met Siti Nafisah from Indonesia at the vegetable market where he was working and married her in 2019.
He recounted, “My wife and I used to work for a solid waste disposal company as street cleaners and we were paid about RM1,000 monthly. However, the company laid off staff after the pandemic hit last year, and we were both retrenched. From then, I started to collect and sell recyclables for a living. We could barely sustain our livelihood and pay the rent.”
Rafik’s income gradually declined owing to the economic impact of the pandemic. When the movement control order (MCO 3.0) was imposed following escalating Covid-19 cases in May this year, the recycling vendors had to suspend their operations. As a result, Rafik could only sell the recyclables he had collected to the middlemen at a lower price, earning a mere RM10 per day. The family could barely scrape by and could no longer afford the monthly rental of RM450.
The volunteers felt deeply sorry for his predicament. Where would the couple and their newborn live? It was risky for Rafik to continue sleeping at the public area in view of the severe pandemic situation.
In order to solve the family’s accommodation issue, the volunteers decided to help Rafik apply for Tzu Chi’s emergency assistance so that he could settle his overdue rental and move back to the rented house. Fong Chuan also called the houseowner, a Malay elderly, to explain Rafik’s predicament. Although the latter empathized with the family’s circumstances, he was not in the pink of health and needed the rental income for his own livelihood.
Fong Chuan then told the houseowner that Tzu Chi is a Buddhist charitable organization, and that he would help Rafik apply for a subsidy from Tzu Chi as soon as possible. Once the application was approved, Rafik would be able to pay off the outstanding rental. The houseowner agreed that as long as Rafik could pay RM1,100, he would waive the remaining arrears and July rental. He was also kind enough to allow Rafik to move back to the house on that very same day.
At around 5 p.m. that evening, Rafik informed Siew Fun that his wife had successfully given birth to a baby girl. He also shared a photo of the baby and said that the midwife would take the baby to the clinic to have the umbilical cord cut. The cost for the entire delivery process, including the clinic charges, was RM1,000.
He expressed, “I am so grateful to you for delivering the RM600 to me in time. That, plus the RM400 I borrowed from my fellow countrymen, are just enough for the delivery cost. I do not know what will become of my baby without your help…”
◎ Grateful beyond words
On July 3, the volunteers presented Tzu Chi’s subsidy to Rafik. The latter was deeply moved that they not only handed to him money for his rental, but also the subsidy for his living expenses, face shields and baby supplies, like diapers, talcum powder and herbal medicated oil.
The couple felt blessed to be able to live together again and welcome their newborn safely. Rafik recalled that their first baby born last year had to undergo treatment at the hospital after birth, owing to health issues arising from delayed medical care. As they could not afford to pay the medical cost, which was a whopping RM14,000, they had to let a couple who was willing to help pay off the bill, to adopt the baby.
With this past experience, they could not help but worry if their second baby would make it to this world smoothly, albeit they looked forward to her arrival. Siti Nafisah especially, often had sleepless nights from excessive anxiety. Fortunately, things worked out well this time around.
“Thank you, God, for gifting us another baby, and thanks to Tzu Chi, we can live together and feel the warmth of home. Apart from feeling grateful, I will work harder to find a job while scavenging for recyclables more diligently. I believe I can earn enough to pay my rent for August and manage our living expenses.”
The volunteers were pleased to hear Rafik’s hopeful and optimistic words. Besides encouraging them, Fong Chuan also introduced Tzu Chi and a plant-based diet to the couple, sharing with them that the assistance they had received had come from the love of the public, and encouraged them to take more vegetables and less meat.
Siew Fun, on the other hand, shared with Siti Nafisah her experience in taking care of a baby. She could feel Siti Nafisah’s joy and happiness from the way the latter lovingly carried her infant daughter. Although she, too, wished to carry the cute baby, she refrained from doing so in observance of safe social distancing. Instead, she silently wished for the baby to grow up safe and healthy.
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Siew Fun is grateful for the opportunity to take part in the tele-assessment and relief distribution for the Covid-19 CBI project. It has allowed her to feel the suffering of the refugees, whom she had zero interaction with otherwise. Moreover, she realizes the importance of timely aid and that everyone is equal. We all breathe the same air regardless of skin colour, origin or status. Hence, we should treat one another as a family and lend a helping hand to anyone who needs it.
“I now understand what Master Cheng Yen meant by ‘Results come after action. Do not wait until there are results to start doing it.’ I hope to continue undertaking the tele-assessment and relief distribution roles for this project, so that more refugees have access to help,” said Siew Fun, who looks forward to everyone extending their love and care, to bring hope and warmth to those in need.
