KUALA LUMPUR, April 19 — A teenager rebuilding her life after a devastating campus explosion is setting her sights on a return abroad, framing her recovery with the kind of resolve more often seen on the sporting stage.A month after regaining consciousness, 19-year-old Reeya Kaur Thandal still cannot recall the moment an air-conditioning compressor exploded at Help University in Kuala Lumpur — an incident that left her with skull fractures and bleeding in the brain.But the gaps in memory have not dented her ambition.“Next year, I’m going to continue my studies in the UK. I can’t wait. I have a few options — Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield or Cardiff,” she told the New Straits Times (NST), adding that friends have been filling her in on missed lessons.“My friends have been updating me on what I’ve missed.

There are a lot of things I missed in class.”The January 12 blast, which occurred during air-conditioning maintenance work, killed 24-year-old Soo Yu Juan, a Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman student who was interning with the contractor. Reeya survived but suffered serious head injuries that wiped out weeks of memory leading up to the incident.“I read messages from a WhatsApp group where someone said it was something like an explosion in my class. I don’t even remember what happened.“I don’t know if something hit me.

I cannot remember anything. I just remember waking up in the hospital,” she was quoted as saying by the national daily.Her recovery has been incremental and hard-fought — closer to a long rehabilitation grind than a sudden comeback. Now described by her parents as “90 per cent conscious”, she is undergoing physiotherapy alongside speech and occupational therapy at a rehabilitation centre in Petaling Jaya.Her mother, Maneejeet Kaur Jasal, recalled the slow return to awareness.“She didn’t wake up suddenly.

She opened her eyes first, then started nodding when I asked her questions.“She was moving her hands and legs and was very restless and agitated. It was overwhelming at first, but it’s such a relief that I can communicate with her now,” Maneejeet added.A turning point came when doctors removed a tracheostomy tube inserted to help her breathe.“The first word she said was ‘no’ because she was in pain from the removal.“Then, for the whole night, she talked non-stop.“I was trying to sleep and asked her to go to sleep. Reeya replied, ‘No, I want to talk’,” Maneejeet said.There have been other milestones — walking with assistance, hugging her mother, eating independently — each one marking a step forward in a recovery that remains incomplete.“When she started walking with assistance, the therapist made her walk towards me and hug me.“It was the first time I heard her voice again and felt her hug. I’m slowly getting her back.“It’s nice to see her eating on her own and craving her favourite food,” Maneejeet added.Her father, Ravin Singh, who commutes weekly from Singapore, said the family is still waiting for answers over the cause of the explosion, with investigations involving police and the Fire and Rescue Department ongoing.“We have not heard anything about the forensic report,” he said.For now, the focus remains on progress — measured not in medals or finish lines, but in regained speech, steps taken, and plans revived.And at the centre of it is a clear target: a delayed journey to the United Kingdom that, for Reeya, now feels less like a plan postponed and more like a comeback in motion.