East Bali Poverty Project brings hope.

(From The Jakarta Post)

Byline: educating the children in basic health, language and agriculture,

Long regarded as one of the brightest jewels in the Indonesian crown, Bali has suffered its share of hardships of late, with the bombings in Kuta in October last year being the most publicized of these.

Long before the terrible act of terrorism impacted the island of Bali and its economy, however, a group of people living in three hamlets in the district of Kubu in Karangasem, East Bali, had been suffering.

As recently as 1998, many of the 10,000 inhabitants of these hamlets lived in such abject poverty as to inspire comparisons to life in the Middle Ages.

With no running water or education, limited food, no medicine and no access to the outside world, the villagers led lives of such subsistence that to dwell any further …