The story of an SIA girl

2 years before she is due for her O Level exams, her Dad told Lilee*, I will be supporting you until your O Level. I can't afford anymore. And that was it. She was only 15. It was very unfortunate. She is a science stream student and her school results have always been commendable.

To prepare for that day, Lilee had 1 objective in mind. She had to be a stewardess. Be it for SIA or for MAS. She got to know from her neighbour & friends that air stewardess earns a pretty good income. Call it bare boldness or pure desperation, she just had to be a stewardess, and nothing in the world can stop her from achieving that.

From then on, Lilee is always looking out for recruitment advertisements and articles of these 2 airlines. Every newspaper and magazine cuttings are compiled and filed. Diligently she did these for 2 whole years.

Her journey was no easy task. Looking like a plain Jane with glasses (not with super thick lenses but nevertheless still a no-no for SIA stewardess), she is the last person anyone can expect to become an SIA stewardess. Lilee ignored any discouraging stares or comments. Immediately on her to-do-list was to get her crooked teeth fixed. Having perfect teeth and smile would be very important if she wants to increase her small chance of becoming a stewardess. And to her horror, her research shows that the cost of braces at that time was a whopping RM5000. It was definitely out of the question. Her family, let alone herself, would never be able to afford that kind of money.

Giving up was not in Lilee's vocabulary. She asked around and researched further. A classmate told her there is this government-aided-dentist facility that she can apply for. This however, is very limited in number and each Malaysian city has an allocated quota. Ipoh's quota has been long exceeded and the waitlist queue could probably be years. Time is not on Lilee's side. Upon further research, Lilee found that there is available slot in Taiping - 2 hour busride north of Ipoh.

After much persuasion, Lilee managed to convince her mom to accompany her to Taiping to check out the Taiping dentist. Lilee also had to do much convincing to the Taiping dentist. And to cut the long story shot, she got the deal! RM500 by instalment. Her mom would then give Lilee RM25 for every dentist visit. This gets her a 2-way bus ticket plus dentist fee. All subsequent dentist trips were done solo. Mom could not afford 2-way ticket for 2 persons.

The other item on her agenda was to register herself for swimming lessons.

Time flies and 2 years was soon over. Lilee completed her O Levels, with flying colours of course. By then her braces had also been removed.

She then waits eagerly for the next advertisement. To her horror, there was no adverts!! Days grew to weeks which grew to months... Her anxiety grows as months pass by.

To her great relieve, an advert from SIA appeared exactly 3 months later. Lilee promptly applied and the rest was history. All her mom could afford was bus tickets for her rounds of interview, one pair of contact lenses and one hard-rock-cafe cap for her to hide her messy hair after the swimming test. And because the pair of contact lenses was all that she had, Lilee could not affort the risk of swiming with them, so she went through her swimming test in blurry vision!

Lilee started flying when she was barely 18. She has beaten all odds to achieve what she wanted to achieve. While flying, she saved up everything she could (with occasionally retail therapies during sales). She studied partime to attain Diploma and eventually her Bachelor Degree. During her stopovers at different cities, instead of only shopping or sightseeing like the rest of the crew, she would also be busy revising and studying.

She lamented about how her Dad was willing to use his retirement savings to fund her younger brother for his University education. There was no hard feelings though. She accepted it and took it in good stride. Perhaps in a rather conservative town like Ipoh, education is more important for boys. Girls are just expected to get themselves simple jobs such as supermarket cashier or librarian, get a husband and eventually becoming a stay-home mom.

With her savings from her flying days, she also helped her family with their house renovation, her dad's medical fees, her brother's car instalment and even an Omega watch for her brother as a present on his graduation.

Now, Lilee is no longer flying. She is now a well-groomed lady with perfect make up and perfect eyesight (thanks to advancement of Lasik). She is also blessed with a good husband and a can't-complain-banking-job.

So the next time you see an SIA girl, don't stereotype her just yet... there are in fact many girls like Lilee in the airlines

...the one who is presenting this article as a special gift for Lilee

*name has been changed to protect identity
photo credit