Living on the island of Pantar, a small island of East Nusa Tenggara province has its challenges, due to limited administrative services, transportation, communication coverage, educational facilities, health, and economy. I experienced this situation as a young person who came from Alimake, Delaki village, Central Pantar district, Alor regency. I, Bernadus Zakarias Weniliwang, familiarly called Bernad, was born in Alimake and spent my childhood to teenager in my hometown. In 2010, having graduated from junior high school, I decided to continue my study in Sumba island, precisely in East Sumba.
It was a difficult decision for a 15-year-old teenager because I had to leave my parents and hometown to fight for learning opportunities and to get a better school in a better environment. This is not without reason, because in my hometown at that time there were limited educational facilities and limited teaching staff, including the limitations in other fields. If the quality of education services is minimum, it impacts the quality of graduates who are less competitive both primary and junior high school, as I had experienced during junior high school. I never got high ranks in class, and even I did not pass the National Examination and had to take the remedy.
I found
a different atmosphere when I started my study in Sumba and I felt that I was
really in a supportive environment to thrive. It could be seen that I became class-winner several times at high
schools and the overall winner and even became the head of the Student Council
of State Senior High School 1 of Pandawai,
East Sumba in 2012/2013. At the college, I majored in Christian Education (PAK)
at Theological Institute of Sumba
Christian Church. Here I experienced better changes when I was actively involved in internal
campus organizations and extra campus organizations, such as Student Executive
Organization, Environmental Student
Community, Indonesia Student National Movement (GMNI), and Stube-HEMAT Sumba,
including learning English and music independently.
After graduation, various questions came up in my mind, started with what will I do next, where I will apply my knowledge, where I stay in Sumba or return to Alor or other places, how the condition of the people in my hometown is. These questions continued to arise because these issues are often discussed in Stube training I joined before, from Social Analysis, Local Potency Entrepreneurship, and Agriculture. With deep consideration, I decided to return to my hometown. There is a desire in my heart to do something useful in my hometown so that the community will develop more by paying attention to farming methods and processing local products. Apart from that, there is my passion to provide assistance and teaching English for youth and children in Alimake and to design activities that support tourism, especially at Pantar island.
When I arrived in my hometown, I faced challenges in the world of work and society, where many scholars were unemployed because they did not have a place to work and job opportunities were not available all the time. For the honorary workers, the amount of regular honorarium incentives is 200-400 thousand rupiah per quarter and regional contract workers are 400-500 thousand rupiah per month. This does not guarantee welfare, so finding out other sources of income is urgently needed. Like or not, I have to survive by using creativity and other skills I got in college, such as making music videos, entrepreneurship in making furniture, and also to be a motorbike taxi driver.
For me, one's success in studies must be balanced with a willingness to benefit others. In the context of the Alor community, success is taking part in improving people's lives through the experiences I have. ***
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