SIJ

Sekolah Indonesia Jeddah or SIJ (formerly known as Sekolah Indonesia Pancasila) is the only Indonesian school located in Jeddah funded by our “beloved” embassy, or Consulate General to be precise. This school is not the best school in the world, in fact it was badly organised, lack of facility and resource, and has gone through financial problems. I wonder what makes our embassy so stingy with regards to education??? Ah, honestly speaking, not only our embassy, but also our governments are doing the same thing! It took only weeks to increase the salary of that stingy DPR (who made the decision? the same people who propose the idea!!) yet it takes years in order to increase the money for the Indonesian education!!! What the hell? (excuse my language)

My mom always told me that she regretted enrolling me into SIJ. At that time, we still lived in Mekkah, and she didn’t know that there existed private schools in Saudi Arabia. She thought that all schools are public, which is free. Unfortunately, my family (except my father) had no official iqamah. It was impossible to enroll me into Saudi’s public school due to the fact that we lived illegally in the Kingdom. So the only option I got was SIJ; thanks to my father’s friend who’s happened to be one of the teachers at SIJ and allowed me to study at this school. So I spent my full elementary and junior high years at this school.

SIJ was the only option for Indonesian people to study back then (1990′s). Language barriers and financial difficulties were the main reasons. There were few english-speaking schools in Jeddah, such as Continental School and Jeddah International School, but these schools have unbeliveably expensive tuition fees. As a result, SIJ became a destination to most Indonesian students living both in Jeddah and Mekkah. It was (and still is) the only Indonesian school in the Middle East who had the largest number of students (500+). But again, I have to say that this school had a very bad reputation even among Indonesians.

SIJ was located in a packed Syarafiyah District, home to most Indonesian and Indian families. Its campus was too small to handle all students range from Kindergarten to High School. There were very limited numbers of small classes, each class filled with 40+ students! It was crowded! There was not even a single lab, and often time we didn’t have any books when the school already started. The school was always late to provide us the books, because they were sent directly from Indonesia. Sometimes the school asked us to buy them by ourselves! It was awful. During 9 years of my study, the embassy didn’t do anything to improve the facility (oh, one thing I remember… a computer lab!! but that was when I was about to graduate). Well, it’s ok if the school doesn’t have science lab, swimming pool, or any other “luxury” facilities (hahaha..), but hello…?? how can you always push us to be cleaver when you can’t even provide us the most important thing in this whole world: BOOKS??

I also feel sorry for SIJ teachers. They were entitled to teach all levels: elementary, junior high, and senior high at the same day! Can you imagine that?? Dealing with elementary students are not the same with high school students. They are completely different! They have different ways of thinking! Elementary students cannot be treated like High School students, and vice versa. I know that it’s costly, but heyyy… we’re wayyyyy behind from the Philippines and India in terms of education! Unfortunately nothing has been done by our embassy, up until now… 16 years since I first stepped into the school… they’re still doing the same thing.

Although I learnt so much things at SIJ, I’m quite dissapointed that I wasn’t taught like any other children in other schools. I was NOT taught to voice my own opinions, love or even encouraged to read books (other than school books), to be as creative as possible and involve in school’s organisation. As a student, my job is to listen! There were no interactions between teachers and students in class (except for some subjects like English and Math). The school hardly ever engaged any activities for the students (lack of money, perhaps?). And when they did, they picked THE SAME PEOPLE on every single musical events to perform. They didn’t trust us, no.. not all of us. They didn’t spread the job to other students who probably wanted to get involved. They didn’t give us opportunity. I don’t feel sorry for myself because I’m not “that big” on musical and performing, but I feel sorry for my friends whose entire 12-years were spent at that school and yet they never had the opportunity to get into “that business”, although I know, that they wanted to do it, so they could be proud of themselves.

With regards to religion, in this case Islam, SIJ (unfortunately) provided only one religion class. I learnt little about the history of Islam and syariah, let alone Fiqh and Al-Qur’an reading (tajwid, etc). Well, yeah.. it’s better than nothing at all. But I’m glad that my mom registered me into the Al-Qur’an-reading (and memorising) course in the Arabic institution (everyday, after school). It was there that I learnt how to read Al-Qur’an properly! Perhaps one of my proudest (childhood) achievements was when I won the Al-Qur’an reading competition held by the Indonesian embassy; not once but twice! hehehe. When I was in SMU Madania, I was chosen among few students to teach my friends how to read the Book properly.

The only positive and annual activity that I always remember was Pramuka (Girl Scouts – Yes, only girls were allowed to participate). Pramuka at SIJ was completely different with the one in Indonesia. No, we didn’t go to the forest or hills, nor we built tent. But we met other girl’s scouts from different countries! There were Americans, British ppl, Greeks, Saudis, etc. So the idea was, every year the chosen host school (representing each country) arrange a Girl Scout event attended by students from other schools in Jeddah from different nations (similar concept to jamboree). It’s not a free event, but it’s worth doing it. I always loved to participate. Because I think it’s a good opportunity to show our identity to other people, i.e. Pramuka’s uniform, flags, batches, national anthems, etc. I remember there was a time that we [SIJ] were chosen as a host of the event. Because of SIJ’s poor building structure and small campus, we “borrowed” Continental School which was a British school and hosted the event there. The Continental School was soooooo huge!!! There were gyms, swimming pools, basketball courts (both indoor and outdoor), and so on.. and so forth. I wished we had a massive school like they had.

The Girl Scout event was usually started (and closed) with the flag ceremony. Each school from representing country assigned several scouts to carry their national and scout flags (and of course these girls should know how to walk properly). For each flag, there was a flag bearer and two flag guards. I was luckily chosen by my teacher every year to either carry or guard the flag. After the flag ceremony, each groups (which were divided by countries) sang their national anthems, recited their Scout Promise, etc. Then there was a time when all of us sang the songs together. After the formal ceremony, it’s time for the informal one. So first we usually had a lunch which was already provided by the host school (because we paid!). After lunch, here’s the fun part!! All girl scouts exchanged the scout’s badges and pins! I loveeed this part, I still have those badges with me – I collected them each year!! I remember I saw a British girl whose back was filled with hundreds of badges and pins from many countries!! Anyway, apart from exchanging badges, we also had the opportunity to make friends and that sort of stuff… It was fun.

After 7 years leaving SIJ, I see no massive difference with regards to the teaching style. SIJ has moved to a better and bigger place, but many parents still complain about how dirty the campus is! The teachers are pretty much the same; most of the teachers who taught me are still teaching at SIJ. Lack of books is still the school’s main problem. So to be honest, there’re only few changes made to the school! I’m totally pissed.