Bali Indonesia - Bali Baby Home

Our Street

My 4 friends and I arrived in Bali on the 4th after traveling for  30+ hours. Somehow we lost January 3 at some point in our travels. We arrived at 7am. We took an uber to our villas which are an hour away. Our driver offered to stop and let us get breakfast if we wanted which we did of course. We have the cutest villas with a bedroom and bathroom. An outdoor kitchen is ours to use as well. It is about a 6-7 minute walk to the Baby Home where we will be volunteering. 

   We dropped off our luggage and headed down to the black sand beach that is nearest us, about 15 minute drive. Just keeping it real, there was a lot of trash and garbage on the beach. There are stunning beaches on the island, we just aren’t in the tourist area. We walked down aways to a little outdoor coffee shop and cafe. $1-2 for iced coffees and matchas that are incredible. We stopped at a night market for street food and fruit on our way back. We had pineapple and pork skewers and fried rice. We ate for a $1.80 for all of us. 

  Back to the main reason we are here, Bali Baby Home. After volunteering in Africa last year, I had been looking for similar places to volunteer that were closer. Well, Bali Indonesia isn’t closer but it seemed like a great place to go. I got in contact with Lucy, the volunteer coordinator from England. Lucy was 21 when she decided she wanted to go volunteer at a baby home somewhere. She got in contact with Bali Baby home and came out here, found a place to live, and stayed for awhile. At this point, Bali baby home had no volunteers, only babysitters and staff. They were well taken care of with food, medical care, and a safe place to stay. What she found was they never got play time, toys, one on one attention, and most had never been outside of the walls they lived in. She worked on building the trust of the founder, Mr. Burhan, and the other staff. She took the babies outside and let them walk and touch the flowers, see the dogs, and get fresh air and sunshine. She fundraised until she was able to build a playroom in the house and fill it with toys, crafts, and preschool activities. She still comes here for a few months at a time throughout the year, but works full time as a nanny in England. After this first trip she worked with Mr. Burhan and asked for permission to develop a volunteer program. Since then she has been working on this project which has been maybe 3 - 4 years. This Baby home is relatively new as well and has only been open a few years before that. They have space for 4 volunteers a day. The playroom is not large, and not many more could fit. We had an orientation with her in October on zoom. This is one of the most organized volunteer programs I have been at. She provided a scheduling app to place ourselves on the schedule for our days. We are required to volunteer 3 days a week, and then can fill in if there are gaps. Surprisingly there are several more volunteers here this month so there is not a lot of extra time to fill in. There is an online book she created that has all the information we could need about the area, getting around, the babies, the schedule, and everything else.

  Bali Baby Home was founded by Mr. Burhan due to the fact that a baby was found abandoned and dead in Indonesia on average every day. Mr Burhan has dedicated his life to changing the outcome for the babies of Indonesia. He started Bali Baby home, and has since opened 2 baby homes in Java, another Indonesian Island. These babies are found in forests, left on toll roads, outside apartments or surrendered by mothers who are alone and terrified with no support from their families. A lot of these are young girls who are not married and would be ostracized by their families if they found out they had a child. The goal is to give these children a second chance, a place that cares for them, loves them, is safe, and treats them with dignity. The biggest goal is to reunite families. Miracles have happened, and babies are going home once the moms turn 18 and can care for them, or families realize how adorable these babies are and let their daughters bring their babies home. These babies are not adopted out. The mommas can FaceTime them, come visit them, and when they are ready, they are welcome to take their baby home. These mamas are given support, counseling and supplies. This approach not only allows the babies to have a safe place to live, but breaks the cycle of abandonment and preserves families. It gives these moms a chance  when there seemed to be no hope left. There are now about 40 babies here. They have also bought the house beside. This house is for the newborns until they can walk. Upstairs are rooms for expectant mothers to stay until their baby is born. There is also a nurse/medical room here for the kids. Some of them have major medical complications. It is also a place where the babies go if they are sick or injured as living in a room with 20+ toddlers is not the best for a kid with broken fingers, etc. 

   The house we volunteer in the most is the toddlers.  Lucy is still building trust with the staff to maybe someday be allowed to help out at the newborn home. We have a set schedule that Lucy has made that we follow. When we arrive in the morning, we set up activities in the playroom. Coloring, counting blocks, or whatever we find. We then go upstairs and each get a child. We only take on each. This is their chance to get one on one attention, and get to play and do what they want. The morning we all get a younger kiddo. We go outside for a walk for an hour. We never get very far. They want to play in the puddles, watch the motors (motorcycles) go by, play with leaves and flower, and just enjoy the outdoors. We head back and play in the playroom for an hour. We take them upstairs for their lunch and nap. We leave during this time. We do not really help much at all with the actual child care. We are there to give them positive attention and make them feel loved. After our lunch break we come back and do the same thing with the older kids. When we say clean up clean up, the all help clean up because they know its time to go upstairs. The last hour between 5-6 we sit outside the play area upstairs. It’s an open area with soft mats and a few magnetic blocks. They hang out here all day every day. We sit outside the gates and play with the kids through the wooden gates. We are not allowed to go in there. Once again, we are building trust with these people. One of the volunteers who has been living here for 4 years gets to go play with them. But those of us who are only here for a month or two do not. 

  There are amazing volunteers here who are great to work with. There is a girl from Alberta, a guy from California, and a guy from New York. And a few more we haven’t met yet. They have been here several months to several years. The kids absolutely adore them. There is a chat we are on with over 100 present and past volunteers. It is a great way to keep in touch once you leave. They are always asking for updates, pictures, etc on the kids. They like us to put photos and videos on the chat about the babies a couple times a week. It’s also a great resource if you have any questions about the baby home or living here. 

  

Our villas

Free breakfast every morning

Our little outdoor kitchen