F

lowers as a symbol of affection have become an essential element for many occasions, hence the saying “say it with flowers.”

Rizka Dwitya Pangesti, 23, is well aware of that. At her wedding recently, she chose roses and lilies for decoration.

Unfortunately, like most brides, she had no idea what to do with the flowers after her wedding was over.

Rizka, who works for a private company in Jakarta, said she handed over responsibility to her wedding planner.

“The wedding planner told me that they were going to burn all the decorations, including the flowers, after the wedding,” she said.

Kevin Mintaraga, the CEO of online wedding vendor directory Bridestory, said usually flowers are dumped especially when they shrivel. “If the flowers still look good, we usually use them at the next event.”

Two friends Mutia Sekar Hapsari and Talisa Dwiyani saw the opportunity of reusing flowers and formed a company called Daur Bunga (Recycling Flowers) in October last year.

It focuses on reusing flowers from weddings.

Mutia, 26, said, the company collected flowers that are in good condition before reusing them at social activities.

Since its establishment, the company has been involved in more than 20 projects. It has donated flowers people in nursing homes and hospitals.

Initially targeting their friends as potential flower donors, Mutia said they have now received donations from various sources, including wedded couples who contacted them through social media or e-mail, and wedding organizers.

Each wedding event, she added, donated bunches of flowers that could be turned into 20 to 100 bouquets.

Every project is conducted one or two days after they receive the donation.

Usually, Mutia said, they would send a team to the a wedding venue to pick flowers that can still be reused. These flowers would be watered to keep it fresh.

“Lilies can survive longer than other flowers. The organizers usually treat the flowers with special care to let them last longer,” she said.

Cofounder Talisa, 27, said that there were some challenges facing the project, especially finding a place to arrange the flowers and hiring staff.

“It is hard to find a public place to arrange the flowers, which takes two to three hours to finish. Logistics were also a problem. We are looking at getting a pick-up truck to collect the flowers at wedding venues. We also need more permanent volunteers,” Talisa said.

In attempt to attract more volunteers, they registered with indorelawan.org, an online platform that connects volunteers with communities.

“We feel like we need to increase the number of volunteers after conducting a few projects. We now have 24 permanent volunteers,” Mutia said.

They have received various responses, from rejection to appreciation. One of the most memorable experiences for her was from an old man, who resides in a nursing home.

“After we gave them the flowers, all of a sudden the man enthusiastically told us about his life. He even showed us his photo album.

“We realized that the flowers became a medium for us to interact with the recipients.

“Like the old man, flowers became ice breaker for the recipients to open up about their lives,” Mutia said.

Zacky Irwandi, who has been volunteering since last November, has a different story to tell. He said he would never forget the moment when he, along with other volunteers of Daur Bunga, visited Dharmais Cancer Hospital to give bouquets to the hospital’s patients.

After they distributed the bouquets to the patients, many of them started to tell their life stories to the volunteers, which made them well up with tears.

“Many of us were touched and could not hide our tears when we listened to the patients,” he said.(rdi)