Dear Friends,

Welcome to the January 2004 edition of the YKIP newsletter. In this issue, we’ll briefly look at what we’ve done in the past year and where we’re going. For more details, please visit our website: http://www.ykip.org.

For those of you who may be reading our newsletter for the first time, the name of our organisation, Yayasan Kemanusiaan Ibu Pertiwi (YKIP) translates from the Indonesian language to mean the Humanitarian Foundation for Mother Earth. It is a non-profit organization created by a group of Indonesians and expatriates in Bali as an extension of their personal efforts to provide some relief and comfort to the victims and their families in the first traumatic days of the Kuta bombing tragedy of October 12th, 2002.

YKIP's original purpose was to provide direct material and medical assistance to Bali's injured victims who were unable to support their families as well as assistance to the families of the deceased, and in the longer term support for the whole Balinese community by developing projects to improve the island's existing medical infrastructure and services. This work is intended as a living tribute to those who were killed, injured or lost loved ones in a disaster that forever changed the lives of so many innocent people in Bali and aboard.
.
YKIP has been run by the incredible dedication of a number of volunteers since October 13, 2002. All of these volunteers have families, jobs and careers of their own and felt it was time to hire a part-time professional to handle the daily management duties. Rucina Ballinger, who has lived on Bali for over 20 years and headed the Wayang Trauma Counseling Project, came on board as CEO in November of 2003. She is in charge of soliciting new proposals, finding donors and upkeep of the website and newsletter.

YKIP is proud to be a community based foundation that is so kindly supported by many good people from within and outside Bali be they Balinese, Indonesians, local expatriates or citizens of the world and funded by the generous donations of organizations and individual well-wishers everywhere.

LOOKING BACK AT 2003

Children's Educational Trust Fund

In a long term, collaborative effort, this project provides educational funding and support for the many children of victims who were killed, injured or who are still missing after the bombing. YKIP joined forces with YKIDS at COURTS to create the YKIP - KIDS educational trust fund. Given the very young age of some of the children concerned, this project will need to have a life span of at least 21 years, another sign of the long road ahead for YKIP. We are currently supporting, either by direct payments to the schools concerned or through Educational Savings Certificate (Tabungan Pendidikan) with Bank Niaga for those children who are still too young to go to school. All school fees, extra lessons, extracurricular activities, school uniforms and shoes are paid for by this fund. We currently are supporting 130 children for the school year 2003-2004. This figure will change as the injured parents become well enough to return to work and are able to support their children’s educational needs.

Long Term Medical Training - Medical Library This project’s purpose is to provide and to equip a medical reference and education center (MREC) housed at Udayana University Medical Faculty. YKIP is working closely with a number of doctors from the university medical faculty and hospitals in Bali to implement a program to improve training for Balinese doctors, medical students and paramedics, both here and overseas.

It provides students and medical personnel with better access to information in Medical Science since the MREC is equipped with comprehensive facilities such as online Medical References, the latest edition of books, and ten computers with internet access. Plans are in the works to get 300 international medical journals on line so students and medical staff can get up-to-date information on the latest medical research and break throughs. Special English programs and a fully equipped language lab are on the same premises as the library to assist students and medical staff in upgrading their English skills. YKIP plans to sponsor courses, fund research grants and seek donations and tutorships from fellow medical faculties and institutions overseas.

Mark Weingard from the Annika Linden Foundation officially opened the Medical Reference and Education Center on October 13, 2003. He said he could think of no better way of honoring the memory of his fiance, Annika and all the other victims who had died in the bombing. Through the generous support of Mark and his Foundation, MREC will be able to serve as a fertile ground for local medical genius.

Wayang Kulit Trauma Counseling Video
YKIP came up with the idea of using a traditional Balinese Wayang Kulit puppet performance as an effective means of reaching large local audiences for trauma counseling via a special story line relating to the Kuta bombing. In February of 2003, with funding from UNICEF, we created a children’s version of the story with the same puppeteer, I Made Sidia and his innovative team of 25 musicians and puppeteers. This was broadcast on TVRI-Denpasar and the subsequent video made from it taken into thirty primary and secondary schools through-out the island, shown to students and teachers and then discussed with an Indonesian psychiatrist. The doctor then met with the parents of said students, informing them of signs of depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and how to help the children cope. This program ended in August 2003.

Upgrading Sanglah Hospital, Denpasar
YKIP was originally founded to help build a burns and trauma unit at Bali's main Sanglah Hospital in Denpasar. However, assistance for this and other projects has now been generously provided by the Australian Government and other organizations. Consequently, YKIP is now awaiting the outcome of an AusAid study to ascertain any further complimentary hospital upgrade projects in Bali that may be feasible for it to undertake. The Australian Memorial Center is slated to open in April 2004.

Database Record of Injured
YKIP worked with other members of the Bali Recovery Group, an alliance of like-minded community organizations, to establish and maintain a computer database record of all local victims of the Kuta tragedy and of their needs and the support provided to them and their families. This database is constantly being updated.

Emergency Response Program
One of the most important lessons to come out of the Kuta tragedy was the lack of general emergency response preparedness in Bali to deal effectively with a crisis of this magnitude. Consequently, 13 medical supply kits have been put together that will equip medical personnel with the appropriate supplies should any event (terrorist act, accident, or act of nature) result in mass casualties (injured or deceased of 40 or more persons).

These kits will be held at various posts around the island, and in the event of a mass casualty incident (M.C.I.) will be distributed to qualified medical / nursing personnel for use on the victims of this event. Each of the basic kits will equip two medics with basic equipment in order to tag and provide initial resuscitation for 20 victims. For location of the kits, please see the website.

October 12th Memorial Day:
Rememberance ceremonies and services were conducted at several locations in and around Kuta throughout the day of Oct 12th, 2003, one year after the bomb. The commemoration of lives lost and the return journey for a number of the survivors of the Sari Club and Paddy's Bar bombing was a poignant reminder that although 'time is a great healer', many more people around the world still carry the emotional scars left by this senseless tragedy.

Family members of the deceased, together with many of the survivors and volunteers of the bombing, as well as political dignitaries, including the Australian Prime Minster John Howard, and the Indonesian Defence Minister Susilio Bambang Yudoyono, were among 2000 people who gathered for the 7 a.m. formal ceremony, at the Garuda Wisnu Kencana ampitheatre, high on the plateau overlooking Kuta.

Later in the afternoon a large gathering attended an informal ceremony on the beach at Kuta, tourists mingled with survivors and relatives of the deceased as local Balinese families and expat residents placed offerings and laid wreaths at the waters' edge. A group of surfers then paddled out into the bay, after forming a circle they laid the offerings on the sunset-hued, mirror-like surface of a peaceful Indian Ocean.

On October 13, 2003, YKIP held a Remembrance Family Day for the victims of the Bali bombing. Families from around the world gathered together to remember their loved ones and socialize with one another. The Bali Hati Foundation sponsored this event, with participation from YKIDS and YKIP at the Grand Bali Beach Hotel in Sanur.

WHAT’S UP IN 2004

We shall be working with other foundations and NGOs in 2004 to assist in new projects

Upgrading the Community Medical Clinic in Legian
A brand new building has been built in Legian that will house the Puskesmas Plus (Legian Community Health Clinic). This clinic is meant to be a model for all of Bali as it will be equipped with modern equipment and the staff will be trained (pending funding) by nurses and doctors from the Royal Perth Hospital in Australia.

YKIP has allotted funds to build a Waste Water Garden at the clinic; ground will be broken for this sometime in February 2004 (for more information on Waste Water Gardens, see www.idepfoundation.org/wwg).

Pasar Badung’s Women’s Clinic
Yayasan Rama Serana has built a Women’s Clinic on the 4th floor of the Pasar Badung (main market in Denpasar). Under the supervision of dr. Upadisari, this clinic has been in operation since September of 2003. It is only open three days a week due to lack of funding. YKIP has agreed to purchase a two-month supply of medications that are given out or sold on a sliding scale basis to clients, the majority of whom come from low-income families. The idea is a brilliant one: to provide information about sexually transmitted diseases and reproductive health as well as provide low-cost or free medications for problems concerning the reproductive organs. Pap smears are conducted here as well. Thousands of women pass through this market daily and are able to visit the clinic during the lull in their business day.

The Clinic is still looking for funding for their long term operations and YKIP hopes that we will be able to assist them in finding donors.

YAKKUM Protheses Workshop
YAKKUM was established in Surakarta, Central Java with the aim of helping impoverished, physically challenged children in obtaining new skills and self-confidence. Aside from outfitting the children with protheses (and having the children themselves make them), new skills such as leatherwork, handicraft and protheses production are arranged for the children. YKIP is helping YAKKUM build a new prothesic and orthopedic workshop in Bali so the children do not have to go to Java for the procurement of their protheses.

YKIP is assisting YAKKUM in looking for funding for this workshop.

MREC (Medical Research and Education Centre) at Udayana University

Students are being interviewed in January for the positions of librarian and research assistant. They will be able to help users of the library in procuring necessary documents, both in hard-copy books and journals as well as in on-line journals. We plan to purchase on-line subscriptions to Pro-Quest, which consists of 300 medical journals.

Fund-raising efforts
Our new director, along with our members, will be conducting an aggressive fund-raising drive so that we can continue our efforts to fund the many worthwhile projects that help the people of Bali to have better lives. We hope that you will help us in this endeavor by contributing to the YKIP General Fund.

DONORS

Since the bomb, we have been blessed with donations, both large and small, from all over the world. Our website lists each and every donor (http://www.ykip.org/dnt_donors_monetary.asp) . However, there are a few major donors whom we would like to acknowledge here :

Mark Weingard/Annika Linden Foundation. Annika Linden was Mark Weingard’s fiance who perished in the bomb. Mark established the Annika Linden Foundation out of respect for her memory and has generously given $100,000 to the YKIDS and MREC projects. He has very kindly pledged to continue to assist YKIP on an on-going basis. With the generous funding from the Annika Linden Foundation, which has promised to fund a number of new projects as well as pay for half the salary of the new directorship, we plan to assist a number of small NGOs on Bali over the course of the next year. Once these projects and the funding are finalized, we shall publish them on our website as well in the next newsletter.

Centrelink of Brisbane, Australia held a Casual Day at all their office last October 2003 and raised over US $25,000 which was donated to the YKIDS educational program. Minister for Family and Community Services, Kay Patterson, handed over the check to Ross Tysoe, former Australian Consul in Bali at a ceremony in Brisbane.

For the October 13th Remembrance Family Day, YKIP received 1,490 excellent quality Teddy Bears from the Victoria (Australia) Police Blue Ribbon Foundation. The remainder of the bears went to orphans all over the island (see http://www.ykip.org/dnt_donors_TeddyBears)

The Hong Kong Rugby Club, which lost 13 of its members in the tragic bombing, established a fund to assist the families of those who perished . They gave YKIDS $110,000 in December 2003. Ariane Walton, whose husband, Clive Walton was the captain of the rugby team, presented the check to Totok Sudarmanto of YKIP on January 2, 2004 at the rugby field at the Grand Bali Beach Hotel. Two Balinese widows and their six children were also present.

Since the bomb, Mitrais has generously contributed office space, phone lines, computers as well as thousands of staff hours from their volunteers to ensure that the vision of YKIP is carried out in a professional and appropriate manner. We would like to thank all of those at Mitrais for their tireless efforts.

We also would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to all our donors, no matter what size or shape of the donation—you are helping to make people happier and healthier!

There is still so much to be done and so many people to help. We need human resources to assist us in carrying out worthwhile projects as well as the financial means to fund them.

If you can assist the people of Bali in some way, your generosity will be greatly appreciated.

Financial contributions to YKIP may be made at either of these banks in Bali.

YKIP is very mindful of the need for complete transparency and the highest ethical standards in handling the donated funds of our generous supporters. YKIP is audited annually on a probono basis by the Public Accounting Firm Drs. Paul Hadiwinata, Hidajat and Associates which is part of the international PKF association. After the audit the YKIP annual accounts will be available to donors and potential donors on request. YKIP would like to thank Drs Hidajat and his colleagues for offering us this service. For further information please go to www.pkfhadiwinata.com

May we also ask you to forward email this newsletter to your family members, friends and business associates who may be interested in supporting the work of Yayasan Kemanusiaan Ibu Pertiwi, YKIP, in Bali.
Thank you for your continuing interest and support and please do not hesitate to contact us if you have queries or suggestions regarding the contents of this newsletter. If you would prefer not to receive a copy of this newsletter in the future, please let us know at the email address below.

Until the next newsletter in April 2004, our kindest regards,
The YKIP Management Team

Jalan Kediri No. 38,
Kuta, Tuban, Bali 80361
Phone: + 62 361 759544 FAX: + 62 361 755024
e-mail: info@ykip.org