When Porntip Pan-in was little, back-to-school time was her mother's nightmare. While other mums and dads would visit shopping malls to buy school uniforms and stationery, the first place Porntip's mother thought of was a pawnshop.
"My family was living hand-to-mouth and my parents had to work extremely hard to make ends meet," recalled Porntip.
"I remember when I was in primary school, before semester started, my mother went to a pawnshop to sell stuff in the house so that she had money to pay my school fees."
Porntip's strong self-determination to study, fuelled by opportunities given to her by others, has turned her life around. From being an underprivileged girl who needed an educational loan each year to be able to study, now Porntip is recognised as the first doctoral graduate to come from the Klong Toey slum - an impoverished area and Bangkok's symbol of perennial underdevelopment and substandard living conditions.
The now 28-year-old has just completed her PhD study in biotechnology from Chulalongkorn University's Faculty of Science. Her programme focuses on how to enhance the body's system of dispersing medicine so drugs are able to work more effectively.
A native of Bangkok, Porntip was born and brought up in Klong Toey and her parents earned their living as low-wage labourers. Such jobs might earn approximately 200 to 300 baht per day, and Porntip recounted that when she was a kid, the family's income was never enough. The tiny amount earned was spent not just on Porntip, but also her older brother and sister who were also in school.
Family destitution eventually forced her brother and sister to leave school after they finished ninth grade so that they could find a job and make money to put food on the table. As the youngest daughter, Porntip was told not to give up her studies. Her parents always taught her about the importance of education and how it could help improve the family's standard of living.
To make sure the little girl could continue her schooling, her parents applied for an educational loan from the Duang Prateep Foundation. Founded and run by activist and Klong Toey slum's angel Prateep Ungsongtham-Hata, the foundation provides financial support for impoverished children until they finish primary school.
Fortunately, Porntip was one of those children. Despite the family's financial hardship, Porntip grew up and never succumbed to self-pity. After primary school, the government's Student Loan Fund became her source of financial aid during her high school years at Mathayom Wat Thatthong School, as well as during her undergraduate study at the Faculty of Allied Health Sciences, Chulalongkorn University.
"I was lucky to get educational loans, without which I would not be able to study in university. And right now I still have to pay back a huge amount of money that I borrowed," she said.
An academic standout, her excellent grades won her a scholarship from The Royal Golden Jubilee PhD Programme.
Organised by Chulalongkorn University in collaboration with the Thailand Research Fund, the scholarship enabled her to pursue her postgraduate and doctoral education.
"I love science," said Porntip in her faculty's laboratory while carefully picking up a test tube containing liquid.
"Biotechnology - especially nanotechnology - is new. My study focused on how nanotechnology can enable less medicine to take better effect among the sick. And I hope my knowledge can one day help improve and save many patients' lives."
Early this year, Porntip returned from a one-year internship programme at John Hopkins University in the US as part of the scholarship. This trip across continents was her first journey abroad and her first time on an aeroplane. She now plans to work as a post-doctoral researcher at Chulalongkorn University's Faculty of Science. This job will probably earn her just enough to upgrade her family's quality of life.
''What I am most worried about is my house. Klong Toey's slum neighbourhood is situated on land owned by the Port Authority of Thailand, and right now the contract has been terminated,'' she said
''Residents in the slum can be asked to leave any time. This is my biggest concern right now. So I need to work, earn some money and look for a new place to live so that my parents can live in safety and comfort. This is how I can pay them back,'' she said.
Porntip conceded she has come a long way from her childhood. Once a poor girl whose parents had to struggle for money to pay their kids' school fees, now she has become the pride of not just her own family, but also the community she has been living in her entire life. Porntip credited her success to her parents who have always stressed the value of education.
''My parents always said that the only thing that can help alleviate a person's living conditions is education,'' she said. ''For poor people like us, education can help us break away from the impoverished world. With it, we have the potential to get what we want. Without it, finding a good job seems impossible - especially in this highly competitive society.
''But with education, life can forever be improved.'' One of the key things behind Porntip's academic triumph has been opportunity. Throughout her study, she was given a lot of opportunities. Her academic scholarship was one of these, and there were other types of assistance willingly handed to her. This, according to her, is one important factor that makes her who she is today.
''Opportunity is more than just luck,'' she said. ''It is an ingredient to cook up your success. But in order to be given that opportunity, you need to make others realise you deserve it and you are good enough for it. Take students, for example. If they don't pay attention to study or they do bad stuff, do they dare ask other people to support them?
''It is important to do your best with whatever you are up to. People look at what you do and when they see your potential, they will give you the opportunity you need. But the first thing you should do is to prove that you are worthy of the reward.
''At the same time, do not wait for an opportunity to come by. You need to widen your perspective and look for opportunities, too. Sometimes an opportunity approaches you, but you choose not to grab it. Then it's another story.''
The new doctoral graduate wishes that her academic success can, in a way, help change attitudes people have towards the Klong Toey slum. While the run-down community has been misunderstood as a place full of drug addicts, thieves, bad kids and illegal activities, Porntip would like people to turn their negative perspectives towards the neighbourhood into positive ones and see her as an example to show that the word ''slum'' does not necessarily mean crime.
''Some of my friends once asked a painful question,'' she said. ''They asked what it is like living in the slum and whether there are drug addicts and so forth. I guess things like that exist in a number of communities. But the truth is that I have never seen such things in the area where I have lived. Sometimes I even think that Klong Toey slum is a safe place to live. Even though it is a run-down part of this big capital city, people live their normal lives. Kids go to school. Adults go to work. It is just that their living conditions might not be as good as for those people outside.
''I wish people would change their view towards the neighbourhood. We are just normal people who unfortunately live a substandard life. Many of us live in poverty.
''There are lots of burdens in life we have to bear. But what's wrong with it? All kinds of suffering and hardship in life gives us strength. And for me, they are simply a good drive for us to not stop struggling and improving ourselves.''
