'Creativity' street children to survive
Dewi Santoso, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
The young busker smiled as he passed around a hat to collect money from passengers on a bus in Kelapa Gading, North Jakarta.
"Thank you for your kindness, ladies and gentlemen. I will use the money you give me to rent a car so me and my friends can ride around the city on Idul Fitri."
The clean-cut busker smiled and kept repeating his thank you while collecting money from the passengers, who seemed willing to pay for what they considered good entertainment.
He, however, is among the lucky few young people forced onto the streets who is able to make a little money and keep a smile on his face.
For Panji, 8, the day begins at dawn.
"I have to wake up at about 5 a.m. to make it to the place where the street singers gather to get instructions from our boss about how much money we have to earn and what we should say to passengers," said Panji, who usually works along Jl. Sabang in Central Jakarta.
He said the "boss" would distribute brown envelopes used to collect money from passengers and passersby. On the front of the envelope is printed: "Please help me, my mother is suffering from a devastating disease and I need money to help cure her".
The letters are neatly written -- too neat for an eight-year- old boy. Panji, the second of five siblings, said he did not write the words. "They were already written on the envelope when the boss gave it to me."
Panji said the envelope helped, but he still had to work from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. to try and collect Rp 60,000 (US$6.67).
"That may seem like a small amount to you, but it's huge for me. I can't collect that much every day. I usually get Rp 30,000," he told The Jakarta Post.
His boss, he said, yelled at him if he failed to bring back enough money. "He yells at me and calls me an idiot. He'll tell me to lose weight so that people will feel sorry for me and give me money."
Neno, a 7-year-old street beggar on Jl. HOS Cokroaminoto, has similar problems.
"I have to collect at least Rp 40,000 a day or my boss will beat me up. Most of the time, I only get between Rp 25,000 and Rp 30,000 a day," said the skinny girl.
A sociologist at the University of Indonesia, Paulus Wirutomo, said the difficulty of life in Jakarta was the main reason behind the growing number of street beggars, who have learned how to seize every opportunity to make money.
"They cannot be considered criminals because they do not violate the law. But they do commit what I'd call 'extralegal' things, which are not covered by the law," he said, pointing to the use of the misleading envelopes to collect money.
"The tough life of the city has pushed them to be 'creative' to try and make money," he added.
He said the government had to improve the country's economy and create more jobs, which would get people off the streets.
"We cannot fight them with force because that would only push them to commit criminal acts, such as picking pockets, burgling homes or robbing people," Paulus said.