JOHOR BUZZ: CONVENT LASS AND PROUD OF IT

IN the course of my work, I’ve been asked often where I’m from. Captain Adzmi Ariffin was one of those that did that when I interviewed him for an article I was writing on him. When I told the helicopter pilot that I was born and grew up in Johor Baru, he asked if I had gone to school at Convent. Yes I did, I told him. “I suspected as much. Johor girls, who speak good English, went to Convent,” he said.
This speaks highly of the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus Johor Bahru at the flood-prone Jalan Yahya Awal, where I had spent 11 years of life from Standard One in 1969 to Form Five in 1979. I had already started school at Convent Bukit Nanas in Kuala Lumpur when my civil servant father was transferred to Johor Baru. We moved south a week before the May 13, 1969 riots.
I was told it wasn’t easy to enrollenrol into Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus Johor Bahru back then. You would have to be “recommended” by someone whose daughter was already studying there.
According to the school history, three nuns and two teachers, Miss Ethel Filders and Miss Winifred Allen, opened the school in 1925. They rented two shop houses along Jalan Ibrahim and named it Convent at the Holy Infant Jesus.
Although it was originally intended for girls, it also admitted boys until 1938 onwards.
The late Sultan Ibrahim and Sultanah Rogayah, impressed with the school, gave a piece of land for the nuns to build a proper school. The new school opened in 1927.
My parents were often asked why they sent me to Convent, then seen as a Christian missionary school, instead of the Sultan Ibrahim Girls School (SIGS) like many other Malay families did. After a while of fielding the question, they their simple reply was that they wanted to be different from others.
I remember Sister Lawrence holding my hands and leading me to class. She and the other nuns taught us girls how to sit properly. “God made chairs with four legs, dear. If He wanted it with two, He would have made it so,” she said, as she slowly pressed my chair to be on all fours.
Sister Lawrence, in her white habit, would roam the corridors of the primary school. In the dimly lit areas, her silhouette could be menacing to us 7-year-olds back then!
She and the other sisters had lived on the first floor of the main school building.There was a small chapel on that floor, where Christian pupils would frequently visit to pray. We, the Malay pupils, would sneak up to the first floor to take a peak at the chapel.
Imagine the shock among my conservative aunties when I told her that Catholic prayers were recited at the morning assembly.
It was a ritual that we went through as pupils at Convent. The bell would be rung; we would all be lined up in pairs according to our classes in the assembly hall, with our bags next to our feet. The Negaraku will would be sung first, accompanied by the piano played by a pupil; followed by the school song, then the prayers and finally, It’s a Small World, which alternated with another song, the name of which I can no longer remember.
And, of course, before the end of the school term, there would be the Christmas pageant in which we would take part, in playing the roles of, among others, the Three Wise Men. I can still remember the lyrics to the Christmas carols we used to sing during the concert.
I was told that the last sister in active service, Sister Hyacinth, left in 1993, and their living quarters were converted into classrooms and an art room.
For decades, Convent has educated and shaped young girls’ lives. I read that International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Rafidah Aziz went to Convent in 1959-1960.
Convent taught me to sew when I was in Standard Four. We cut, sew and embroidered a skirt. In Form One to Form Three, we not only sewed (an apron and a housecoat) but waswere also taught to cook, from the simplest of sandwiches to preparing full lunch and dinner meals.
We were also big on folk dances, turning the assembly hall into a ballroom especially when we had to cancel PE (physical exercise) classes when it rained!
One thing for sure is, we also excelled academically and in sports. When some of us in KL went back for our 10th reunion in 1989 at the then Holiday Inn Johor Baru, we had among us lawyers, accountants, auditors, academicians, a piano teacher, a journalist and a dietician. One former student put herself down on the list as “woman of leisure”.
Our girls also represented the district and state at sports meets. We hade a mean netball team back then, under the tutelage of the diminutive Mrs Olivero, winning school, district and state-level competitions. We either meet the SIGS team or that from Sekolah Tun Fatimah, the all-girls boarding school, in the finals.
So, little wonder that Convent produced the best athletes. From the 1979 batch is Dr Kok Lian Yee who, when contacted, remembered being the head prefect who was penalised (probably the only one) to stand on the table by our school headmistress then, Mrs Ramakrishnan.
Lian Yee is currently now a lecturer at the Department of Sports Studies at Universiti Putra Malaysia. She is now actively involved within the coaching of athletes, especially in sports such as netball, swimming and badminton. In 2001, the National Sports Council named her “Coach of the Year (Female, High Performance Athletes)”.
We hooked up via email recently. We hope to meet up soon, together with others we know who have moved to KL, to relive the good old Convent days as the lyrics of our school song aptly putsput it:

Here’s a rousing cheer
For our Convent dear
On fair Johor Bahru
May we be faithful to every rule
to each tradition true
Though weal or woe, we forward go
United great and small
In virtue simple and duty strong
Is the motto for us all
In virtue simple and duty strong
Is the motto for us all
Though far we roam our ancient home
Our thoughts will often stray
Back to these happy convent days
Where our hearts are warm and gay
We love each dear familiar room
And gaze with rightful pride
At our lofty building on the hill
Where Malaysian sunshine smiles
At our lofty building on the hill
Where Malaysian sunshine smiles

Note: Every Friday onwards, I will be posting articles of my MyJohor column. The printed version of it appears in Johor Buzz, the insert for the southern edition of the NST, very Monday.