When Sally Hetherington first witnessed deeply rooted poverty, she wanted to help as much as she could.
But as she spent time working in Cambodia, she realised that foreigners could do more harm than good.
Ms Hetherington is an advocate for "the reduction and elimination of voluntourism" - a holiday in which people volunteer to help people in places they visit.
She published a book in 2021 about her experience, titled It's Not About Me.
It documents how voluntourism can disempower local staff, create children with attachment issues and "an unhealthy white-saviour syndrome in visitors".
Ms Hetherington, who grew up in Adamstown Heights, found a way to help people help themselves.
She founded the Human and Hope charity and enabled Cambodians to run it.
A yoga challenge, titled Bloody Unstoppable, is being held this week to help the charity raise money.
Ms Hetherington said "our goal is to raise $25,000".
She said this would "help provide more than 600 girls in Cambodia with reusable period kits and menstrual health education".
The program helps keep girls in school in Cambodia.
"Many girls miss school there simply because they don't have access to period products or accurate information about menstruation," Ms Hetherington said.
The program helps create fair wage jobs for Cambodian women through sewing programs.
"Every kit is handmade by local Cambodian women through Human and Hope's vocational training programs," Ms Hetherington said.
She added that the challenge was about "creating meaningful impact through small collective actions".
"You don't need to change the world overnight to make a difference in someone's life," she said.
Newcastle's Alana Kosklin has joined the challenge.
"This is a chance to reconnect with our shared humanity and support something bigger than ourselves," Ms Kosklin said.
"It's a simple way to do some good, feel connected and help create opportunities for girls who deserve the chance to stay in school and shape their own futures."
Ms Hetherington bought a one-way ticket to Cambodia in 2011 at age 25, with the aim of helping people in poverty.
"It wasn't until I travelled through Myanmar and Cambodia that I saw what entrenched poverty looks like up close," Ms Hetherington said.
"What stayed with me wasn't just the lack of resources, but the strength and resilience of the communities themselves."
She quit her job in Australia and "moved to Cambodia thinking I wanted to help".
"Over time, I realised the most important thing was supporting local people to lead solutions for their own communities," she said.
She spent a year in Cambodia volunteering at a school for former street children.
"I started questioning the role foreigners often play in aid work, believing that communities couldn't develop without us," she said.
"What I learnt was that local solutions to local issues create lasting change and long-term trust."
She connected with a Cambodian team running a nightly English school at a pagoda.
Ms Hetherington, a University of Newcastle business graduate, helped Cambodian staff to "transform the school into a registered charity".
"Together, we built a model designed to be locally led," she said.
The Human and Hope organisation is "run entirely by Cambodian staff".
The charity's Australian arm "exists to support fundraising and partnership work".
She made herself redundant at the Cambodian organisation in 2016, achieving her goal of empowering locals.
The charity became one of Cambodia's first non-government organisations to become entirely run by local staff, with no foreign staff members, volunteers or board members.
More information can be found at bloodyunstoppable.org.
