12 Trailblazers Who Have Overcome Adversity to Reach Their Personal Best

These inspiring individuals have triumphed over discrimination, disabilities and much more

EKO YULI IRAWAN

From goatherd to Olympic medalist

The son of a pedicab driver and a market stall attendant, Eko Yuli Irawan didn’t dream of much beyond tending to goats, which he did every day after school to help his family make ends meet. Seeing potential, a local coach let Irawan train for free at his weightlifting gym, a decision that changed Irawan’s life.

Today, the 30-year-old athlete from Sumatra is a three-time Olympian, having won bronze medals in Beijing and London and a silver in Rio de Janeiro. The fact that he’s done this and more despite his tiny stature of 5ft 2in has made him a national hero in his native Indonesia.

After winning gold at the 2019 World Weightlifting Championships, he has his sights set at the top of the podium in Tokyo next year, and eventually wants to be recognised as the greatest of all time, a different kind of GOAT altogether.

NOOR MASTURA

Grassroots activist giving hope to the hopeless Singaporean Noor Mastura had a tumultuous childhood, living for years without a home or enough to eat. At one point, it got to be too much, and Mastura ascended the highest building she could find, fully intending to jump. “But a voice in my head said ‘Not like this, not now’,” says Noor. She eventually climbed down from the ledge, telling herself that things would get better.

They did, and after struggling to make herself and her family more financially secure, Mastura vowed to do what she could so that no one else in Singapore would go hungry, founding nonprofit Back2Basics in 2013 to deliver free groceries to underprivileged families and homebound older people. Two years later she co-founded her other non-profit, Interfaith Youth Circle, to encourage dialogue between religions. For her work with both organisations, she was named Singaporean of the Year 2018 by The Straits Times. Not one to lay low, Mastura recently launched Being Bravely Woman, a platform to tackle issues of female empowerment specific to the Muslim world.

CHIAU HAW CHOON

From gangster to CEO Chiau Haw Choon grew up in a good family. He spent his days playing in the hardware shop founded by his grandfather in the small Malaysian town of Megat Dewa. But his life went off the rails when he was 13, after his family moved to Alor Setar, a much larger city, so his father could expand the family business into cement trading. Chiau dropped out of school and became involved in gangs. Two years later, he was caught up in a criminal investigation and thrown into a police lockup for five days. He didn’t return to school until he reached the age of 17, after a period of self-reflection.

Once he applied himself to his studies, Chiau unexpectedly found himself taking the reins of the family company in his early twenties, when his father suddenly became ill. “I didn’t expect to be taking over so soon,” he says. “The only experience

I had was as part of a gang.” Nonetheless, Chiau quickly expanded the business. Within three years, the Chin Hin Group had moved far beyond cement trading, becoming Malaysia’s largest distribution company for building materials. The firm eventually evolved into two separate publicly listed companies, making Chiau, who is now 36, the youngest head of a publicly listed company in Malaysia.

HANA ALFIKIH

Giving hope to millions with mental illnesses

As a child, Hana Alfikih never fit in. Bullied at school and miserable at home, the Jakarta resident turned to drawing to soothe her nerves and distract herself from the impulse to self-harm. Only much later, at university, was Alfikih diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

Today, she continues to use art as therapy, but for the benefit of her thousands of social-media followers, who know her by the moniker Hana Madness—reportedly named for her fondness of UK ska band Madness, rather than her global advocacy for mental health causes. Her illustrations feature colourful characters named after mental illnesses and medications, such as Bipo, Skizo and Medico, designed to amuse and disarm. Her mission is to reduce the stigma around mental health in Indonesia, where the practice of pasung, or confining mental illness sufferers in cages and removing them from society, is all too common. Alfikih tackles the issue head on in a recently released documentary, In Chains.

NALUTPORN KRAIRIKSH

Journalist and human rights activist

As a journalist, humanrights activist and LGBTQ ally, Nalutporn Krairiksh is a fierce advocate for those who struggle to have their voices heard in her native Thailand, speaking up for inclusion in all its forms.

Frustrated by the lack of access and consideration offered to disabled people, Krairiksh, who was diagnosed with ALS as a child and is wheelchairbound, is also the founder of ThisAble.me, an online platform that publishes news and human-interest stories about disability rights, using her writing to bring awareness to subjects that don’t usually receive the spotlight—from less glamorous issues such as public transport access to systemic bias.

Krairiksh is also a founding member of the Future Forward Party, now the social group Move Forward, which is focused on social justice issues and made significant inroads in the 2019 Thai election.