Hope for Bali’s Remote Hamlets

Hope for Bali’s Remote Hamlets
Report Lisa Siregar | September 20, 2010

Life is simple, but definitely not easy, for the residents of Cegi and Pengalusan, two of the most isolated hamlets in Ban village in East Bali.

Ban consists of 15 hamlets that stretch for more than 7,000 hectares up the slopes of Agung and Abang mountains. Cegi and Pengalusan are the closest to Agung’s crater.

Residents of the hamlets live among a harsh mountainous landscape, linked to the other hamlets by a series of narrow dirt tracks.

Daily life in the hamlets stands in stark contrast to the modern and glamorous sun-kissed existence around the beach communities of Kuta, Legian and Seminyak.

For decades, the forgotten residents of Cegi and Pengalusan survived without ready access to clean water, markets or health and education facilities. And until recently, leaving the hamlets meant a lengthy walk just to reach the nearest paved road.

Ineh Radiasa, who lives in Pengalusan hamlet, said that the lack of ready access to basic necessities meant that many of the children living in the remote hamlet were illiterate and suffered from high rates of malnutrition.

“The closest Puskesmas [community health center] is about a three-hour walk away, so when someone is sick, we carry them together and walk there,” she said.

However, life is looking up for residents. Last month saw the completion of an asphalt road connecting the two hamlets to the others, making their area reachable by motorized vehicles.

“Before there was a road it was such hard work just to be able to get here,” said Ni Luh Toni Parwati, head of the Puskesmas in the town of Kubu. “Whenever I climbed up here, I always got a stomachache.”

She regularly made the arduous trek to the hamlets to run a posyandu, a monthly health check-up booth.

The new road is the welcome result of efforts by the East Bali Poverty Project, a nonprofit organization founded by an Englishman named David Booth in 1998.

The foundation helps underprivileged people to improve their situations by educating them about sanitation, nutrition and farming techniques. The educational aspect is key, as stated in Booth’s overriding principle: “No money, no gifts, only knowledge.”

Booth said that he started the East Bali Poverty Project to help the residents help themselves. So far, the project has helped to improve the lives of some 3,000 families around Ban village.

“You don’t just give help to people and then leave,” Booth said. “That is immoral.”

Booth said he had traveled to 45 countries and seen some of their poorest, most isolated areas. But he said that none were as difficult to provide aid to as Ban.

According to Booth, overall health conditions in the village were very poor, with little basic sanitation. Parents needed to be told to keep their children from accidentally eating animal feces.

And before attending health classes that the foundation offered, some villagers neglected washing their clothes and had never properly brushed their teeth.

Booth said he first stumbled on the remote area in the early 1990s. According to him, the existence of the far-flung communities was unknown to the government at that time.

But even though their village is isolated and offers few creature comforts, Booth discovered a group of people who are tied to the land and reluctant to leave.

“We were born here, our ancestors are here and our temple is here,” said Nyoman, a resident of Pengalusan.

It is hard to believe that the residents live just a short drive from some of the world’s most attractive tourist destinations. Their daily life reflects the simplicity of their surroundings.

Many women earn a living by making and selling plaited rattan baskets.

Another common way to earn money is through raising cows, and every day, large groups of men and children walk into the forest to scythe grass to feed their livestock.

Leading such a spartan existence, basic activities such as record-keeping were never practiced When the foundation members began offering educational programs for the children, they had trouble sorting them based on their ages.

“We had to guess the children’s ages,” Booth said. “No one knows, there was no record and documentation never was important.”

Booth created his own textbook to help educated the villagers. The book, titled “The Art of Learning by Doing,” is a bilingual guidebook specifically aimed at the people of East Bali.

Among its chapters are lessons on health, hygiene, farming and art. It even covers extracurricular activities such as martial arts and yoga.

Villagers said their lives had improved since East Bali Poverty Project began working in the area.

“Our neighborhood used to be dirty, there was trash everywhere and our houses were broken,” Ineh said. “It was before Pak David taught us to clean up.”

Booth runs his foundation with donations from dozens of sources including corporations, schools and individuals. His own dedication to helping the poor stems from his own experience of growing up poor.

He said that his family was so poor that his parents were uneasy about their son going to university. In 2004, Booth was named a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for his charitable work.

From donations, the foundation has been able to build much-needed infrastructure around Ban, such as toilets and an art center for the students.

Now, children and teens living in the village are able to dream bigger.

Ketut Tangkil and Komang Simpen are both 17 and taking a government-approved education program equivalent to high school. They said they wanted to contribute to their village when they grew up.

Ketut wants to be a math teacher and Komang wants to be the first dentist in his hamlet. “Seeing people help us makes me want to help others,” Komang said.