Amelia Priest continues her volunteering journey with Karma Group, this time with the Bali Life Foundation… Here she shares her experience.
In 2022, in the early days of the Ukraine conflict, Karma Group made the decision to use our Normandy resort to provide shelter for affected families to seek refuge. This was when, Victoria Williamson, Karma Group’s Head of Philanthropy, got in touch, asking for help running a Summer camp for young refugees for a couple of weeks.
‘My friend Liz and I ran various activities for the children, keeping them entertained as well as teaching them some English. My time volunteering in Normandy made me realise I wanted to do more. Given Karma Group operates globally, I enquired with Victoria about further community projects I could be involved with.
This is when my boyfriend Fin and I found out about the Bali Life Foundation – a sanctuary for underprivileged children and their mothers. The heart of the foundation lies in providing education, instilling positive values and creating a safe space for mothers to generate income through their artistry. The mothers are able to devote their time to create beautiful handmade textile items that generate an income, whilst the children are looked after at the centre.
We have just completed our first week at the Foundation and it has been a unique and pleasurable experience. Our involvement at the centre took the form of one-on-one English lessons with the children. Currently they are learning about the parts of the body and the alphabet and we are helping to promote this learning further.
Aside from teaching the children English, we have been playing games with them, doing arts and crafts and playing futsal on Friday afternoons. They always end the day with traditional Balinese dance lessons in which all age groups get involved. We are looking forward to spending a further two weeks getting to know the children and helping to improve their English, enabling the children to open their doors to a brighter future.’
