Story

War tragically pushed Asmaa out of her home country, Syria, where her destiny had been written as a wife and mother with only 16 years of age. Asmaa rebuilt her adult identity as the neighborhood storyteller and began using reading aloud to children for fun as a bridge to tackle critical issues in her new community at the Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan.

Seven years later, with Asmaa’s first born daughter reaching adolescence, a flashback of her education deprived past emerges and inspires her to embark on a new read aloud project to empower teenage girls to build a future of opportunities she never had. Despite her complex living situation as a refugee and the community’s conservative mindset, Asmaa is determined to raise a conscious generation of successful women.

The Neighborhood Storyteller is a documentary feature film that explores human resilience, the transition from child to adult and one's capacity to turn hardships into an opportunity for self growth.

Take Action:

 Asmaa is a representative of the millions of beneficiaries supported by The Big Heart Foundation (TBHF) and other charities and organizations around the world. True and tangible impact is often led and endorsed by those we support and serve. At The Big Heart Foundation, this represents our objective and our main evaluation criterion for the projects we do. The film is a representation of how empowering an individual through adversity can transform their lives and create a positive ripple effect in their community.

Together we can multiply the impact.

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