I WAS born in Kuantan but lived my young life in Terengganu. The reason for this was my dad was an estate manager near Kemaman and the nearest town for my mum to deliver me was in Kuantan.
So, it was no surprise to anyone that I went to school in Kemaman. In SK Sultan Ismail I was the only non–Malay student in both primary and secondary school. To the chagrin of my mum, an English teacher, I scored higher in Bahasa Malaysia than I did in English.
Going to school from the estate took an hour every morning but it was a great experience being in that school.
Later on, when I was 9, my dad was transferred to another estate even further in and it would take more than 2 hours just to get to school. He then made the decision to move all of us – my mum, siblings and me – to Seremban, his hometown.
My parents chose to send me to St Paul’s Institution and not my dad’s alma mater King George V School. I’m thankful for this decision to this day.
I started at St Paul’s, or better known as SPI, when I was in Year 4. Coming from Kemaman, I was suddenly faced with a myriad of faces, races and cultures to assimilate with. Thankfully, all my classmates, as kids often do, took me in without any fuss. Seems like we didn’t teach children how to be racist back then.
Being the new kid in town, everyone was very friendly, and the teachers took the time to get to know my parents. Since my dad was a local boy, some of them even knew him or his family.
Teachers did not give up
All this didn’t at all help me, because we are talking about an era where teachers were proper teachers. They scolded you, challenged you and at times even beat you. But they were really invested in your studies. Your failure made them feel like failures, I think.
Just because they knew my parents, I didn’t get a free pass. My dad being a Seremban boy and having got a scholarship to study in Singapore back then, and my mum having a double master’s degree from India, just piled the pressure on me.
So, I tried to run away by being more involved in sports. Not being naturally talented like my dad, who represented the school and state in hockey, I picked football. But the teachers still didn’t let up.
We got proper training and we always had to make sure we understood what we had to do and why we were doing it. Being a student of SPI was something to be very proud of and we were taught to hold ourselves up to a higher standard.
Coming first from a school where I was a minority to another where there was a fair representation of all cultures made me more rounded. I ate, drank, played, stayed and celebrated with all races. This was the norm. It was expected of us to love all.
Our school motto is “Virtute et labore”, which means “with courage and effort”. I’m not sure about courage, but I can tell you that the teachers instilled a lot of effort in us.
Get-together with unity and respect
This past weekend, most of us met again. Now 55-years-old and just a part of the great legacy of the school, we joined about 1,600 others in one of the biggest gatherings of any school in Malaysia. The St Paul’s Institution alumni dinner is among the biggest in the nation, and we regularly have more than 1,600 gathered for dinner and games every first Saturday of September.
This year was especially meaningful after missing the past two years due to Covid-19. We have lost many friends but it was great to catch up and see friends of old, from every race, colour, social background and standing, who are where we are today thanks to the school.
SPI has educated leaders of corporations, doctors, lawyers, engineers and even about 11 Olympians, and has broken numerous national records. We are one of the schools that has both football and hockey pitches, badminton courts and even running tracks.
But more than that, many of these leaders now lead with a multicultural make-up in their own organisations. They learnt this all in their time in school.
I write this now, as I’ve been truly blessed to study in a school system that prided itself on unity and respect for each other, and I was reminded of this over the past weekend.
We are fast approaching the looming general election, which has brought out a bunch of politicians who only seem to want to sow fear and hatred in fellow Malaysians. This serves as a reminder, for me at least, that our strength as Malaysians comes from the diversity we’ve always had. As some other countries try to achieve this type of tolerance and diversity, many of us were born into it here. Once upon a time, we taught it in schools.
So, I for one am glad to be born in Malaysia. And no two-bit hustler politician out to steal our wealth is going to divide me from my fellow brothers and sisters of this great country of ours. And I learnt that in St Paul’s Institution. – The Vibes, September 6, 2022
Manvir Victor is an executive editor at The Vibes
