Simon Tabuni has been a clever, hardworking student ever since he was a child. Despite the limitations he had back then in his hometown, his passion and spirit is barely dimmed. Here’s his story.
The Early Life of Simon Tabuni
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Simon Tabuni was born in Arfai, Manokwari on October 23rd, 1990. Then, he was raised in Babo, Bintuni Bay District, Papua.
He started his early education at INPRES Babo Elementary School. Then, he continued enrolling at YPPK Catholic Junior High School and St. Paul Senior High School.
After finishing high school, he took Linguistics at Universitas Negeri Papua. During college, he joined many different activities, such as being part of some research projects held by PUSBADAYA UNIPA, working at CELD (Central Endangered for Language Documentation) UNIPA, and other inspiring activities.
Simon’s Hard Work to Pursue Higher Education
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Even though his undergraduate days were over, Simon did not stop pursuing his bigger dream to attend graduate school overseas.
His persistence and hard work finally paid off when he was granted a scholarship from LPDP and accepted to the School of Oriental and African Study, University of London. However, there was an insane amount of effort behind his success.
Despite his lack of English skills, Simon did not easily give up. He kept trying to join some English competitions to challenge himself, even though the results were not as good as he expected.
But, from his story, you can learn how one can break limitations if he has the will to do so.
Coming Back to Papua and Serving Local Community
After finishing his degree, Simon came back to his hometown and served the local community.
Back then, when he was still a student in London, he did not only attend college and study. Instead, he also learned about store management in the place he used to work.
Then, he used those experiences as the foundation to build his hometown. His main goals are to widen the distribution of the local agricultural products and accommodate the local youths. Hence, he initiated some helpful programs.
Firstly, he founded an inspirational movement called “Papua Inspiratif”. He initiated many innovative programs, one of them being “Angkat Mama Papua” in that program.
Basically, “Angkat Mama Papua” is an entrepreneurship movement to elevate the local women’s economic condition, especially those living in rural areas, such as the Arfak mountains area.
He helped promote the products from these women via social media and supported them in making more variations of processed products.
In addition, he also created another movement where he provided local youths with accommodation for their creativity called “Fasilitas Kreativitas dan Inovatif Anak Papua (Fastra)”.
He makes serious efforts to discover talented youths from Papua through this movement. The program includes transforming local youths’ hobbies and interests into economically valuable things.
Another great movement coming from this brilliant man is called “Revitalisasi Taman dan Fungsinya (Remang)”. Living up to its name, the program aims to activate and revitalise the city park.
A city park is an important place where the locals gather to stroll around or do other activities. Therefore, he began to improvise its function and elevate the small business around the city park—accordingly, the park functions as a recreational place and economic centre.
The Overflowing Passion of Simon Tabuni
For all his contributions to building his hometown, Simon was awarded the “Inspirational Youth Leader” for his contributions to building his hometown at the West Papua Innovation Award event in 2020.
Simon Tabuni is living proof of someone with an overflowing passion for making his dreams come true and giving back to the community. You can learn that nothing compares to hard work and determination despite the limitations you may face.
