Liquiça, October 23, 2024 (Média Democracia) – João Tilman Correia 69 years old with his wife, Olandina Gracilda Soares 67 years old, they live in Raucasa, Lauhata Village, Liquiça, they chose to make a living through filtering sand in the river to meet their daily needs.
João said that for years they only lived by filtering sand and cutting wood to support family needs.
“I have filtered sand for years, starting from the period of Indonesia to this day. Every day, I have to do my daily activities such as at 6:00 in the morning I have to wake up to prepare to go to the river, every morning I have to have breakfast before going to the river and filtering sand, but sometimes I don’t have breakfast, I only brought one bottle of water to the river, I filtered and dig a lot of sand, if I felt hungry then I decided to return home for lunch, then I returned to the river to continue my activities, sometimes my wife helped me with bringing food for me, because she also filtered sand in the river to help me and the two of us always complement each other.” João said
He continued that in good time there was a car carrying sand, sometimes not, but he kept trying to wait and work because to meet their needs.
“One ret sand is $ 25.00 or $ 40.00 but depends on the buyer, if there is a car that is transport or there are people who buy it then we can get money like one day we can get $ 50.00 or $ 25.00, Sometimes almost in a week there are no cars transport sand so we are very difficult to get money. In the rainy season we will not filter sand because of the flow of river water and wet sand so we can’t do anything. Therefore, my wife and I decided to cut wood to sell for $ 1.00 per bunch, from the money we collected together to buy our food and pay the school fees for our children.” He said
Olandina Gracilda as João’s wife added that, life in the family as a partner must work together and support each other to earn life through working in a river to get money.
“I always help my husband in every job he does, because I know that in the family we have to support each other to get money. So, every day I always help him through filtering sand in the river, in the morning I always wake up early to make breakfast to go filtering sand, and before 11:00am I have to return home to prepare for lunch after lunch, we take a little nap and then we go to filter sand. If we are diligent and try hard then we can filter up to one ret or may not, but we continue to work because life depends on our work in the river to get money. Normally, I do not transport my own sand because I am a woman so my husband helped me to transport my sand.” She said
She added that she felt that she felt the work of filtering sand was not a woman’s job but only because of their needs she had to do men’s work.
“Most, my children were angry with me because I did a man’s work, but I answered them, ‘If I don’t do this job then who will give us money, and if I don’t do any work, I feel like I will be sick so it’s better for me to do this job ‘. So, every day I have to filter sand but when it rains we cannot filter sand so we look for wood and cut it for sale to get money. The money that my husband and I got we collected in order to use for our daily needs.” She added
She explained more that life in the family must complement each other how to get money to meet daily needs. This simple family consists of 11 members, such as a husband and a wife, three sons and 6 daughters, their 8 children are married and one is still in college.
Reported by : Tomas
Photo : Tomas