“I asked a kid who lived in that slum what she wanted to be when she grew up,” Jenny Tjoa said. “Her answer was, ‘I want to be nothing.’”
Returning home to Indonesia in late 2013 after 15 years studying and dealing abroad, Jenny was catapulted into motion by that conversation. How could any child grow up with the thought of “being nothing”?
Together along with her friend Georges Hilaul, an expert Indonesian-Dutch magician, she founded Inspiration Factory Foundation in late 2014. Inspiration Factory operates within the slums of Jakarta – educating and empowering slum children to dream of a greater tomorrow. They each gave up the whole lot to run Inspiration Factory full time.
Under a muddy, dark motorway bridge, the muse and its volunteers hold classes on Sunday mornings. Each child receives a brand new green uniform and an identical school bag. The Inspiration Factory Foundation reaches 300 children living under the motorway.
Sunday school enrollment requires three things: wearing a uniform; being punctual; bringing a superb behavior badge (a sticker system to encourage proper behavior). There was 100% compliance.
Each week, the kids’s classes cover English and basic literacy. They are given a “dream book” by which they write their dreams and hopes. Each class pertains to their dream.
“Every child deserves a dream,” Jenny said. Our higher worldSingapore International Foundation’s storytelling initiative. “Everyone has a purpose. Everyone has greatness inside them.”
“We took the kids to the movies recently,” Georges said. The luxury shopping center — with its modern multiplex cinema — is positioned near the kids’s shantytown.
“Part of the trip was for them to see what other jobs were available,” Georges said. Our higher world.
She means professions apart from being a garbage collector, a roadside trinket seller, or a prostitute, because these are sometimes the one professions that children have contact with.
On the last Sunday of each month, all those that rejoice a birthday that month attend a birthday ceremony and receive gifts.
And the stories keep coming. Stories about how some kids do not know their birthdays.
Some of their parents just didn’t care enough to recollect the day. That’s why Inspiration Factory gives them a birthday. Because someone has to recollect and rejoice the day you were born.
The Inspiration Factory Foundation works beyond books and bags under a highway bridge. Their biggest gift is the reality that each child born within the slums has deep value, dignity, hope and dignity. The truth is that each child born within the slums needs someone to inform them that.
From now on, they’ll grow up with a dream and the strength that may allow them to achieve high for it.
Support the Inspiration Factory Foundation by remission, volunteering or getting your group or company involved.
Authorship history Our higher world – telling stories about good that encourage motion.
