Lofty Dreams of a Village Girl
In Welahan hamlet, Grobogan regency, Central Java, most girls are married after graduating from middle school. Febri Mustikawati defied the tradition. She chose to pursue higher education. After she realized her dream, she tried to spread the same dream to other children in her village through the establishment of a reading room.
In mid-2010, ahead of her graduation from the middle school, Febri, the only daughter of the two children of Kasman and Sulistyawati, had grave doubts. She did not want to be like her neighbors or her older brother Andi Susilo who did not continue to high school upon finishing middle school. Many of them ended up working as housemaids in big cities or getting married early and staying at home to manage their households.
Febri wished to continue her education and avoid the same fate that had befallen her friends and brother. On the other hand, she understood the scarcity her family faced. Her father worked as a public minivan driver and her mother was a housemaid. Their income was only enough to carry the family through another day.
However, Febri was determined to pursue a better future for herself. One day, she gained the courage to tell her parents about her plans. Her father went quiet and her mother immediately rejected her ideas. Her mother said that there would be no use for a woman with higher education. In the end, women will always go back to the kitchen and serve the family. Her mother wished her to follow in her footsteps and become a housemaid to help with the family’s finances.
“But I persisted. I believed that I needed to pursue higher education if I wanted to help people. If I backed down, perhaps I will not be in Jakarta today. I would have had kids by now,” said Febri, laughing. Kompas interviewed her at the #AkuBaca (#IRead) inspirational talk at the Bentara Budaya Jakarta (BBJ) cultural space on Wednesday (17/5/2017).
Her determination became stronger after she overheard her neighbors belittling her dreams and her parents. “Your daughter wants to go to school. Can you actually send her to one?” Febri said, quoting what people asked her mother.
At Welahan hamlet, Tambaksewo village, Grobogan regency, in 2010, no woman had ever gone to a high school. The hamlet, located not far from the bubbling Bleduk Kuwu volcanic soil, is the home of 150 families.
Hard work
Through various means, Febri finally convinced her parents to allow her to go to a high school. She chose to enroll at the SMK 1 vocational high school in Purwodadi. Her idea was simple: By going to a vocational school, she would get the necessary skills to be employed.
The school is located 30 kilometers away from Welahan hamlet. Every dawn, she went to school on a public minivan and she went back home in the afternoon. Other than transportation costs, she needed to cover a monthly school fee of Rp 200,000 (US$15).
“My father worked harder. Sometimes I saw him getting tired at the terminal and it bothered me. My mother was also [working harder]. That was why I was determined to seek ways to help my parents,” said the girl, who was born in 1995.
Once she was in the 11th grade, she participated in accounting competitions at regency, provincial and national levels. From the competitions, she gained academic achievements and won money prizes. “It was not fame that I was seeking. It was the money,” she said, laughing.
Upon graduating from the vocational high school in 2013, she was at a crossroads once again. Febri wished to pursue even higher education to gain a better future for her family and her community. However, she needed money to go to college. “Where can you get the money from? Poor people like you, what can you do? Where will you live? What work will you do once you graduate?” Febri said, repeating her neighbors’ questions to her at the time.
Febri’s father unexpectedly supported her decision, as long as Febri could support herself. Febri agreed to this. She took the entrance exam at the Semarang State University’s accounting department and passed. Afterwards, she got a Bidik Misi scholarship that paid her college fees and daily expenses. Up to mid-2017, Febri was the only person in her village to have enrolled in a college.
Books as the light of knowledge
Febri said she realized that education is important to change people’s lives. Based on this idea, Febri established the Golek Ilmu (Searching for Knowledge) reading space in her village during the holiday period at the end of her first college semester. “My goal was simple. I wanted to help the children in my village build dreams. It used to be that when people asked us what we wanted to be when we grew up, we did not know what to say,” Febri said.
She then asked five children who were about 6 years old to come to her house. In the living room of her parents’ home, she taught them to read, introduced them to books and emphasized the importance of dreams. She taught them to dance and tell stories with puppets using YouTube videos.
Slowly, but surely, she gained many students. She then asked her friends to help her find books: comic books, story books, school books. She obtained everything, little by little. Every day she was at home, no less than 50 children came by. Over time, her book collection increased until it filled a two-meter book case.
As Semarang is not that far away from Grobogan, only a two-hour drive, she could go home every weekend. She set aside some money from her scholarship to buy books. Apart from approaching the children in her village, she also tried to approach their mothers. She attended local gatherings. She said that this was important as the children’s education was determined by their parents.
“I also asked my friend who was active in entrepreneurial activities to come by the village. She gave motivational speeches and taught the local mothers to empower themselves. In the end, several of the mothers established home businesses, such as making jagung marning (corn-based snacks) and selling them at local markets.”
Febri also helped several local high school students prepare themselves to go to college, although one of the teenagers that she helped decided not to go. Febri said there were things that she and the teenagers could not change. “I always console myself by saying that, at least, the teenagers have had dreams,” Febri said.
The one question that is still haunting her to this day is what she will do once she graduates from college. She said she has a moral responsibility to the people in her hamlet. “No matter what, I have to get a good job because I need to prove to everyone that we can go anywhere we want once we have a college degree.”