MataHari: Eye of the Day works with a select team of community members and professional consultants from a variety of fields who are uniquely equipped to assist community members negotiate a path through complex governmental systems and social networks. Our community members are immigrants and people of color from all over the world as well as persons from the US who are trafficked and exploited domestically. Our staff and consultants have origins in countries and cultures throughout Africa; Asia; Europe; South America; Latin America; and North America. We are many different colors, races, and religions. We speak at least 15 languages including: Bahasa Indonesia, Bangla, English, French, Haitian Creole, Hindi, Japanese, Malay, Nepali, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Tagalog, Tamil, Vietnamese and Urdu.
STAFF
Carol Gomez – Founding Director
Carol is a relentless community organizer with a knack for jumping into the driver’s seat and getting things done. She migrated from her home country of Malaysia and quickly immersed herself in social justice work in Massachusetts, strategically choosing to work in the fields of public health, criminal justice, mental healthcare, community based research and higher education in order to gain concrete skills and insider knowledge of the inner workings of each system. Carol founded the Spirit of Activism award- winning TVOS Network in 2002 (subsequently renamed MataHari: Eye of the Day in 2005).
She has received numerous accolades, including the Peace and Justice Award, National Women’s Conference Leadership award among others for her innovative work in the community. Carol is a skilled educator, counselor, domestic violence advocate, popular education training, facilitator and mediator. She provides training and consultation on a variety of issues including human rights and social justice practice, cross-cultural communication, family violence, modern day slavery and trafficking, organizational development, community organizing and leadership development. She divides her time between sunny California, where she currently resides, and the seasonable Massachusetts, her home for the past two decades. Wherever she is though, good friends and good food follow.
Monique Nguyen – Deputy Director / Lead Organizer
In addition to handling the everyday operations of MataHari the core of her work is also organizing for rights and dignity for domestic workers — one of the last few labor forces unprotected by US labor laws and largely the world. Monique is committed to expanding her reach in the community, growing as a leader, and working cross culturally to build a truly global social justice movement holding on to the belief that real social change begins with the transformation of individuals and committed to developing fellow women leaders. Her passion is rooted in her struggles as an immigrant/refugee and former undocumented student. In addition to her role at MataHari, others in the community know Monique for her involvement with Boston Progress Arts Collective and the Student Immigrant Movement. She is a daughter of Vietnam War refugees.
Kerline Auguste Tofuri – Community Organizer/Associate Director
Is a native of Haiti who moved to MA in 1985. Attended Boston English High School from 1985-1987; Went to UMass Boston and graduated in 1993.
Currently working at Tufts University as Project Coordinator on a New Immigrant Health Grant at the John Hancock Research Center on Physical Activity, Nutrition, and Obesity Prevention.
Founded Jou Nouvo in March 2008. Jou Nouvo, meaning “New Day” in Haitian Creole works in collaboration with Partners in Development, Inc. Jou Nouvo got its start by offering an adult literacy class as a platform to discuss social and health issues to ten women in Bon Repos, Haiti.
PID/Jou Nouvo-specific projects include increased access to medical care, loans for small businesses, as well as adult literacy and child sponsorship programs. PID initiatives have served individuals in Haiti and in Guatemala through small business loans, housing projects, child sponsorship programs and monthly medical clinics.
Worked as Project Manager for the English for New Bostonians (ENB) from March 2001- July 2009. English for New Bostonians is a public-private-community partnership initiated by the Mayor’s Office of New Bostonians. Trained and taught English as a Second Language (ESOL) at Adult Community programs throughout Boston and Cambridge. Had traveled and worked with missionary teams several times to the bateys in the Dominican Republic. She will continue to travel to Haiti at least twice a year to oversee PID/Jou Nouvo programs.
Doris Cristobal – Community Organizer/Associate Director
Doris is currently a student at UMASS boston studying early childhood education. In addition to being a full-time student, Doris is a commercial housekeeper, a union member, and a steward of SEIU-615. As a former domestic worker, in 2006, she won a lawsuit against her employer for 4 weeks of back wages. From her struggle of gaining rights in the workplace, she was inspired to better her English enabling her to help Latino brothers and sisters in the same situation. She leads a workshop titled, “Struggling Against Sexual Harassment in the Workplace” alongside Pedro Malave (SEIU organizer) and Ingrid Nava (Director of the Legal Service Center).
She is passionate about the plight of immigrant women workers and their safety in the workplace, she feels that it is not just about discrimination and inequality, but sexual harassment is one of the main issues the women face and it is her mission to eradicate sexual harassment in order to improve the quality of life in the workplace.
In July 2010, Doris along with other women established Moviemiento de Mujeres (Latino Women Movement) with the sole purpose of fighting violence against women. The group meets on the last Saturday of every month to discuss, plan, and endorse activities in defense of the Latino community.
Joining MataHari in September 2010, she is excited to be a part of our work in awakening the conscience about human rights; specifically, about immigrant women who are survivors of human trafficking and exploitation, those suffering from family isolation, sexual violence and other human rights abuses. Further committing herself to the fight against any kind of abuse and injustice.
Sandy Wright – Community Organizer & Development Associate
He co-founded and co-directed the organizing group Deported Diaspora from 2008-2010. For several years Sandy worked as an education advocate, organizer and youth worker in Portland, Maine. He holds a master’s degree in organizational management from the School of International Training.
VOLUNTEERS
Brenda Sanya
Carla Gomez
Crystal Baik – is a 1.5 generation Korean from southern California. She has been involved with, and invested in domestic violence advocacy and documentation work for the past 11 years: she served as a rape and sexual assault counselor at Williams College, MA, during her undergraduate years, and worked as a projects coordinator at Asian Women’s Shelter (AWS) in San Francisco from 2004-2008. She has also been a board member of several organizations, including Creative Interventions– an Oakland-based organization looking for means to address violence through community-based tactics– and Free Battered Women, a statewide coalition of advocates and activists addressing domestic violence among incarcerated women. She is also a certified yoga teacher who teaches in immigrant and people-of-color communities, and seeks to use holistic means– intellectual, political, spiritual and somatic– to address daily forms of violence. Crystal received a master’s degree in oral history from Columbia University, and is currently pursuing her doctorate degree in American Studies & Ethnicity from the University of Southern California (USC).
Francesca Contreras – is currently a waitress in Brookline who recently graduated from Brown University where she studied Africana Studies and Latin American Studies. A half Mexican-American, half British daughter of a relentless journalist on the move, she was born in Mexico but bounced from there to Argentina, South Africa, Israel and finally Miami all within a couple of decades in true ping-pong ball style.
As a student in Providence, she was co-founder and steering committee member of Brown Students for Justice in Palestine mobilizing the Brown community to divest its holdings from companies involved in the illegal Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Off-campus, she taught at the Paulo-Freire inspired ESOL school, English for Action, and worked as a computer tutor and immigrants rights organizer with Olneyville Neighborhood Association in Rhode Island.
Lilly Marcelin – Counselor/Community Organizer French and Haitian Creole speaking sexual assault and domestic violence counselor and educator. She has extensive experience working on issues such has human trafficking, modern day slavery, gender based violence and immigrants rights. She is also a skilled grassroots community organizer, event planner and fundraiser.
Srav Puranam – An undergraduate student at MIT, Srav moved to Boston around two years ago and has been working with MataHari since October 2010. Back in her hometown of San Jose, CA, she was actively involved in Domestic Violence and Hate Crime prevention programs. In 2006, she set up a program along with the City of San Jose to inspire young girls in rural India to continue with their education, despite the violence and anger they faced from their families. With a scholarship program, a penpal exchange between the girls and students in America, and a domestic violence awareness clinic, the program was able to help more than 200 girls get out of the cycle of poverty and is still currently expanding.
Additionally, Srav was a founding member of “Not in Our School,” a movement to end acceptance of hate crimes across school campuses and their communities across the country. She has much experience leading discussions about these types of issues to large audiences as well as interacting first hand with victims of hate crimes and domestic violence.
