Kids laughter and joyful shouts fill the air, steps that hurry, mom’s demanding, but gentle voices that call their children into place. Sounds carry like a breeze throughout this warm morning as we are approaching the Bali Street Mums Yayasan* (*Yayasan is the Indonesian word for foundation) located in a quiet neighbourhood in Denpasar, Bali, one of the projects we as Ananda Soul have been supporting for years.
The Bali Street Mums Project is a non-profit organisation that has started in 2014 and been established in 2019 by Kim Farr with the intention to provide desperately needed resources including shelter, clothing, education, basic health care and food to impoverished women and children in Denpasar.
Ananda Soul has been supporting the Bali Street Mums since December 2022 providing donations through contributing fixed portions of our profits as well as 100% of the profits of a selection of our charity bracelets (more to come here soon). To support mothers and children is a cause that has been part of our DNA since day one of our brand.
Bali – an island with many faces
Despite Bail’s tourism focused reputation as an island paradise, the beauty of its beaches and blissful waters hide the tragic poverty of its people. Balinese women and children in particular face extreme challenges to survival: high unemployment and little education, infant mortality and malnutrition. Add to this the danger of trafficking and forced prostitution. Unsanitary conditions in substandard housing, lack of running water, prevalent sewage.
Roughly 25 million people in Indonesia live below the poverty line. A further 20 percent teeter on the brink, with income just marginally above poverty.
Since its origins in a one room shack, Bali Street Mums has empowered over 400 women and children with shelter, safety, education and resources. And the Yayasan keeps on growing.
What the Bali Street Mums project does
The Bali Street Mums mainly focusses on rescuing abused children and mothers from the streets, to drive them with shelter and food, medical aid and counselling and education to keep them off the streets.
The mothers are empowered through job opportunities given to them, such as creating dolls, dreamcatchers, macrame bags, beaded necklaces & bracelets to be sold in the market.
Mother and children receive a weekly allowance starting from IDR 200k to IDR 400k for their personal needs. Further the Yayasan offers safe housing, so the family can stay, cook, work, live, play and study together without the fears of unsafety, danger and poverty dangling above their heads.
This offers the opportunity to build lives on their own, to their own liking.
Our visit
Our visit to one of the safe houses in Denpasar was an experience like no other. Our eyes grasp warm yellow walls, kid’s paintings, beading stations, food stations, piles of laundry, seating groups, kids dancing and playing in the courtyard – these are only few impressions we manage to caption with our eyes and hearts. Simple, one may think, but so much a part of life – a life that gets to be normal. Knowing some of their stories, the observation of normalcy turns into something profoundly special.
We are deeply touched by the generosity, warmth and openness of the children. They greet us, hug us, climb on our laps, bring us drawings and make us laugh and dance among them.
It is beautiful to witness how the children hold on to one another.
A lovely anecdote shared by Mega, the manager, is that often the kids come to ask if they can all sleep together in the big video room where matresses create a giant fort and slumber party. They seek to be near to one another.
To date the Bali Street Mums support a total of 35 mothers, 125 children and 6 babies.
What success means here
We asked the founder and managers: what makes this organisation a success?
To see the families safe, healthy, thriving, smiling and most importantly staying, instead of choosing to go back to the streets. To see most families staying off the streets, being in support to one another and form a bigger family bond. To work with one another and together to create and make products.
Bali Street Mums also offers the opportunity for some of the families to return to their original villages with BSM building them a small house and offering a weekly allowance to keep them off the streets continuously. Seeing them all to live in a proper place, having access to proper meals is the biggest achievement to the team.
Our Mother’s Day campaign this year
We have been in support of the Bali Street Mums since December 2022 with the launch of our charity bracelets, our Luna Crescent bracelet of which 100% of profits flow towards BSM.
This Mother’s Day we continue to support the project through our donations with our brand-new ‘Through it all’ charity bracelet – a bracelet that holds the energy of Mary Magdalene and her ever present, unconditional love that carries and nurtures us through a love that holds one through everything life leads us through.
From April 11th to May 13th we are giving away our new ‘Through it all’ charity bracelet as a free gift to every purchase made online during this specific period.
After May 13th this bracelet becomes part of our charity bracelet collection and will continue to support the Bali Street Mum project through 100% of our profits.
*Nasi Goreeeeeeng*
Let’s keep caring and sharing the love we hold for mothers and their children, this Mother’s Day and any day. Thank you for all your continued love and support.
