Donna Christha Renata, Struggling to Include the Deaf

Donna Christha Renata, has set up a learning community that strives for the social inclusion of deaf people in Bitung city, She calls it Kaleb, a place where friends with disabilities gain knowledge and skills.

KOMPAS/KRISTIAN OKA PRASETYADI

Donna Christha Renata

Instead of staple foods or monthly cash aid, what can make disabled people independent is access to education, training and employment. Based on this principle, Donna Christha Renata, 31, has set up a learning community that strives for the social inclusion of deaf people in Bitung city, North Sulawesi. She calls it Kaleb, a place where friends with disabilities gain knowledge and skills for self-reliance.

“In Kaleb, our deaf friends are no longer people with disabilities because there’s already communication access. We can communicate with them and treat them according to their ages so that they are no longer marginalized,” said Chira, as Donna Christha is commonly called, when visited on Friday afternoon in early June 2022. Kaleb is an acronym for Komunitas Tuli Peduli Bitung (Bitung Community for the Care of the Deaf). Chira founded it on 13 Sept., 2018, two years after she arrived to settle in the industrial city. She converted her house located in Madidir district into a learning and skill training center for the deaf.