A retired couple in New Zealand is scraping funds together to bring their daughter home from Bali after she was severely injured in a motorbike crash on the Indonesian island.
Kiwi woman Teenica Harrex faces a US$200,000 bill, which apparently includes medical expenses incurred so far and the cost of a medivac to send her back to New Zealand.
Unfortunately Harrex was not insured while in Bali, according to the bio on a Givealittle crowdfunding page, set up by the woman’s nephew, so it’s all got to come out of pocket.
The 42-year-old had been working as an English teacher in Kuta for about a year, says her father, Ian Harrex, who has had to dip into his and his wife’s retirements to keep their daughter alive.
Ian Harrex says he’s already spent over US$90,000 of his own money and hopes to recover some of the costs and get his daughter back to Oamaru, New Zealand, probably via an air ambulance.
“Ian and Ann, who are a retired couple in their 70’s have had to use their life savings to keep their daughter alive. We desperately want to get her home safe,” reads the fundraising bio on the Givealittle page.
Harrex’s crash was on Dec. 10, just days before she was due to return home on Dec. 14. Her father says it happened around 2:30am when she was coming back to her flat after visiting friends. It’s suspected that it could have been a hit and run since there was another motorbike left at the scene with Harrex and her own bike, Ian Harrex told Stuff New Zealand.
“There was a rumor that it could have been a hit and run. There was two scooters left there [the crash scene] and there was only Teenica there,” he said, as quoted by Stuff.
“Teenica was obviously hit in the side – she had horrific damage to her ribs, a collapsed lung, and … a massive bang to her brain,” he explained.
Harrex was rushed to BIMC Hospital. Part of her skull was removed so fluid could be drained out and a clot taken out of her brain.
The woman has since been transferred from the ICU to a general ward, according to an update posted to her GoFundMe page on Monday.
The GoFundMe page, set up by her aunt and uncle, Sharyn and Trevor Harrex, has raised just over US$7,000 of its US$200,00 goal, as of Tuesday evening, while the Givealittle page was up to US$1,700.
“Teenica’s parents are heart broken to say the least and it is Christmas time as well so even harder. This is our way of helping to get Teenica back home to her family and we would be so truly grateful if you can help in anyway through our GoFundMe page,” the crowdfunding summary reads.
The New Zealander is far from the first foreigner in Bali in recent years to turn to crowdfunding to back a medevac home. A number of foreigners in Bali, whether tourists or expats, in the past several years either were involved in accidents and did not have insurance or did have insurance but not covered under their plans, including an acrobat injured during a performance and a little girl who drowned in a villa pool.
