At 67, Dr Maria Chong Abdullah is enjoying her retirement more than she could have ever envisioned. Since 2018, the former senior lecturer at Universiti Putra Malaysia’s Faculty of Educational Studies is pursuing her passion, learning art – watercolour painting, acrylic painting, charcoal drawing, Chinese calligraphy, and more.
She spends “many hours every day” on her passion, which she says has been rekindled after being put on the backburner for decades.
“Art brings me joy and I am so excited to be able to learn art with my peers who share the same interest as me,” says Maria.
Maria enrolled for the art classes offered by the University of the Third Age (U3A) in 2018 after finding out about their availability from a friend.
“I retired in 2016. But I only found out about the art classes two years later. So I went online to find out more, and I registered immediately. I was really so happy to have found these formal classes. I only wished I had heard about them as soon as I’d retired ... I felt like I had wasted two years when I could have been pursuing my passion,” says Maria who lives in Bangi with her husband, Abd Rahim Talib.
Even throughout the pandemic and the various movement control order periods, Maria didn’t stop learning. Classes were online and they went on mostly uninterrupted.
“I haven’t stopped taking the classes since (2018). This semester I am registered for six classes, such as charcoal drawing, Chinese calligraphy, watercolour painting and others. Sometimes, I take the same course a few times. I don’t mind learning the same subject over and over because I think I will always be learning something new and improving my skills,” she says.
Maria says that the art classes have given her a sense of accomplishment that has made her life more complete.
“It also rejuvenates me and gives me peace. It has also been good for my mental health. I also appreciate the environment more as I look at nature from an artistic point of view,” she says.
Apart from her classes at U3A, Maria spends any free time she has watching online art tutorials so that she can “learn some more”.
“I don’t go out much. I don’t enjoy shopping or other activities. Just art. And I am grateful that I have a loving husband and family who support my passion so that I can spend many hours doing what I love,” she says.
Even as a young girl, Maria loved art. She loved to draw and paint and even though she didn’t always have access to learn art “properly”, she kept her paint brushes close.
“I loved art classes in school ... in the lower forms. Even though we didn’t really learn much about art in school – mostly the teacher would just put a topic down on the blackboard and we’d have to draw something based on that – I enjoyed doing the work. Art really wasn’t taught seriously in school. In upper secondary, because I went to the Science stream, I couldn’t learn art anymore.
“But I still took art as a subject for the STPM (Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia)! I didn’t go for any lessons but I just practised on my own and I got a principal pass!” she says, proudly.
After school, however, art was put on the backburner as life – her career, children and family – took over. Maria started her career as a teacher but, ever the learner – “I have been learning all my life” – she went on to pursue her undergraduate and postgraduate degrees while balancing family and career.
“I didn’t really have much time for myself or for art. But, I would pick up my paint brushes every now and then. When my husband (also a teacher) and I lived in Sarawak, there were some really beautiful rivers where we lived and I would sit outside and paint them. And, when my students did batik painting, I joined them too,” she says.
But nothing was quite as fulfilling as enrolling in the formal classes she now has access to.
“I didn’t realise I had the talent until I enrolled in these classes. I have learnt so much and am continuing to learn. Some classes, like Chinese calligraphy and watercolour paining, are so hard and so, I practise and practise and do them over and over. I appreciate the criticism from my teachers because that’s how I can improve. And, I look forward to homework because it challenges me,” says Maria.
“Art has brought me so much joy. Doing art makes me happy and it gives me confidence and a sense of value as a person. Doing my art is different from my academic work ans I am grateful for the talent that God has given me and I don’t want to waste it, and will go on painting for as long as I am physically able to,” she says.
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