(Bali) - A couple of kilometres from the Kerobokan "death-tower" on a windy Seminyak street a group of recovering addicts - mainly Australians - are trying to get clean.
Overseeing the group is Richard Smith, an Australian addiction therapist who established the recovery facility four years ago.
While his passion is helping others achieve a drug-free life, Mr Smith said over the past few weeks he's been distracted, his mind constantly wandering to the plight of the two Australians facing an unthinkable end.
Mr Smith feels empathy for the men. In 'another life', he too smuggled drugs in and out of Asian countries defying the threat of the death penalty.
"Same sort of quantities as what these guys have been caught with; strapping heroin to our bodies and going through customs," he told SBS.
During his career as a "mule" Mr Smith was also a chaotic heroin user, and the proceeds fuelled his growing habit, meaning consequences were rarely considered.
Richard Smith at his rehabilitation facility "Seasons" in Seminyak, Bali. (Luke Waters/SBS)
"Certainly you don't think death penalty, number one. You don't think you're going to get caught. Nobody thinks 'I'm going to get caught. This is what the outcome might be,'" he said.
While he escaped detection in his cross-border smuggling, Mr Smith was jailed in Australia.
His redemption was long and painful and after detoxing from drugs, he qualified as a counsellor and established successful rehabilitation clinics in Australia and abroad.
He said "faking" rehabilitation is possible, but believes Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran are absolutely genuine.
"They've sustained this support, this work so they've actually changed their life. So it's a complete - what I would call - 'psychic reversal,' he said.
Lending weight to Mr Smith's assertions is one of his Indonesian employees Sandy Syahram.
Another former heroin user-turned counsellor, Mr Syahram has volunteered at Kerokoban and seen first-hand the impact Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran have had on the prison and fellow inmates.
"They real. They real. After I see him, after first time I do volunteer work in jail, he totally change. New people come into the jail and he helping give motivation - that's what I know Myuran and Andrew," he explained.
Mr Syahram says other prisoners have volunteered to be executed instead of the pair, many fearing their absence will leave a considerable void inside the white walls of Kerobokan.
"It's going to be stop for sure. No-one going to get course for computer. No-one get course for painting because they're the only helping people in there. If they get killed and execution, who's going to do that?"
Opportunity, Mr Smith believes, is the only true road to rehab - and it is possible inside or outside the prison walls.
"Keep them in prison for the rest of their life. Have them help the prisoners when they arrive - they're a productive part of that prison community. To end their lives ends all their programs."
Related reading
PM phones Widodo over Bali Nine pair
Share
