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HIS HOME: A single lane leads to the house where Toni and his family lives, one of many scattered dwellings in a Medan village of about 800 people. -- ST PHOTO: K.C.Vijayan
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MEDAN - WHEN they got married seven years ago, they started life in a shack that was bedroom, kitchen and living room all in one. And it leaked.
Today the house, though still a work in progress, is more than three times bigger, the floors are tiled and part of the walls plastered. There is a small prayer room fronted by an arch though the hall is void of furniture. When you enter, the woman of the house rolls out a small carpet on which you both sit cross-legged and talk.
This is the home of Toni, the Indonesian man who was jailed in Singapore for selling his kidney in an organ-trading case here. But his wife, who wanted to be known only as Madam Putri, said none of the money he collected from the deal paid for the house.
She did not even know that his kidney had been removed, until much later.
The mother of two children said she took up several factory jobs and helped at the family's rice farm over the years to raise the money.
She is still struggling to clear the remaining 25 million rupiah (about S$3,775) of monthly instalments.
Interviewed by The Straits Times in their village home in Medan, Sumatra, the 26-year-old said she was so shocked when first told that her husband was involved in the organ-trading syndicate that she suffered a miscarriage.
'I could not eat for a week, threw up and found it difficult to sleep,' she said.
She has not had the chance to tell her husband about the miscarriage as she has yet to speak to him.
She was then more than two months' pregnant and had to tell her village folk and siblings that she miscarried when she had a fall.
Toni, 27, sold one of his kidneys through a Singapore intermediary to an Indonesian woman identified as Juliana Soh for 186 million rupiah last March.
Shortly after the successful transplant in a Singapore hospital, he became a runner for another would-be donor named Sulaiman Damanik.
They were both nabbed in Singapore.
Toni is now serving a 31/2-month jail term here for abetting an illegal organ-trading operation, among other charges. Sulaiman, 26, was convicted and jailed for three weeks.
In the Singapore courts, the case against retail magnate Tang Wee Sung for allegedly trying to buy a kidney from Sulaiman is still pending. He is also charged with lying to the ethics committee of Mount Elizabeth Hospital and making a false declaration.
Holding back her tears, Madam Putri said that she had not been able to speak to her husband since he left for Singapore in June.
An Indonesian consular official from Singapore contacted her and told her about her husband's case.
She said on both occasions when her husband went to Singapore, he told her he was going there to look for a job.
Toni was retrenched earlier this year in Medan after having worked for more than four years as a cleaner.
He then helped to grow rice in the farm together with his wife and hoped to start an ice-cream business.
'After he came back from his first trip to Singapore, I did not know he had given up his kidney.
'He said he felt tired often but we did not see each other much for the few weeks he was in Medan before he went back to Singapore again.
'Sometimes he would stay at a friend's place and some days I would miss seeing him as I worked on shifts in a factory.'
For the second trip, he told Madam Putri that he would return in a week. However, he was arrested, convicted and jailed.
Madam Putri described her husband as hardworking, quiet and devoted. They have known each other since childhood.
All she wants for now is for her husband to return as soon as possible as she is unclear if he will be required to remain in Singapore after his jail term, which is due to end this month. She fears he may be held back as a witness as the probe into others involved continues.
'Every day, my kids ask where their dad is and I have to explain in some way and say he will be back soon,' she said.
vijayan@sph.com.sg
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