Bellinda Luke has worked extremely hard to get her Grey Wolf Award after coming to terms with her family’s house burning down two years ago.By Sarah Schwager
A HAMPTON Park girl has risen from the ashes to receive her Grey Wolf Award.
Bellinda Luke, 11, was devastated when her family’s house burnt down in August 2005, the family losing not only all their possessions but also their beloved pet cat Tiger, who perished in the fire.
On Friday, after many months of hard work earning badges, Bellinda received the distinguished and rarely awarded Cub Scouts honour in her Narre Warren Scout group.
Bellinda said life since the fire had certainly been difficult.
“It’s been hard but I’ve gotten over it,” she said.
“I lost everything. Nearly every piece of clothing I’ve got is a hand-me-down from other people. I love hand-me-downs now.”
Bellinda and her older brother Elliott, who were nine and 10 when they lost their house, had to jump from the second storey of the burning building with mum Margaret to their dad Dennis, who caught them below.
“It was scary, it was really high off the ground. It was kind of freaky. At that point I didn’t really trust my dad, I just jumped,” Bellinda said.
The Luke family only moved into their newly rebuilt home in December, after 16 months of couch hopping and renting.
Mrs Luke said their life would have been a lot harder if it wasn’t for the Scouts.
“The Scouts have been really important in our lives,” she said.
“Without them it would have been a lot harder to cope. The support they gave us was just magnificent.”
Mrs Luke said it had also helped Bellinda get through as she had taken the loss the hardest, unlike Elliot, 13, who has Asberger’s syndrome and therefore got over it a lot quicker.
She said Kilberry Valley Primary School had also been good.
“The principal (Jan White) rang us that morning,” Mrs Luke said. “By lunchtime she had given them new school uniforms and schoolbags. She turned up on our neighbour’s doorstep. It was just brilliant, you can’t ask for better support than that.”
Mrs Luke said three things saved the family when their two-and-a-half- year-old television blew up in the middle of the night.
The first was their cat, who meowed, waking them up; the second was the smoke detector and the third was Scouts, as without the group the family members may not have known what to do.
“We all knew what to do in a fire, we had an emergency plan and the kids didn’t panic,” Mrs Luke said.
“We thought ‘we know we can do this, it’s just another fire drill. We’ve got to stick together, stay down low’, and we didn’t take anything. Not even the cat in the end. He perished. That was hard.”
The family named their new house the Phoenix – rising from the ashes, which Mrs Luke said was appropriate.
She said despite losing so much the family felt lucky and was so grateful at the immense generosity of the community.
Mrs Luke said people were amazing, with a Scouting family they hardly knew letting them housesit for six weeks, and the school sending them to a camp for a few days to get away from everything.
“We were then able to find a rental but it was an absolute nightmare with the insurance company,” she said.
“It took months before we got anything. What do they think you’re wearing, sleeping on, eating with?
“We needed pots and pans and knives and forks.
“Nobody ever has enough insurance – it’s all those little things like the doormat, the cushion on the couch, the photos on the wall.”
