Future holds hope for street children

I.D. Nugroho, Surabaya

It was an early evening one day last year when Hermanto and Wawan (not their real names) caroused with their friends on Jl. Semut Kali, Surabaya. The unkempt boys gulped down alcohol and laughed well into their umpteenth bottle.

Wawan, a burly street child, fell asleep, but awoke suddenly. Calling to Hermanto, he said, "Let's go to my house. I have money to buy more drinks."

Hermanto recalled that he followed without much thought, recounting the tale recently to The Jakarta Post. Upon arriving at the house, Wawan invited him into a room.

All of a sudden, Wawan stripped, pointed a pair of scissors at Hermanto and forced him to lie face down.

"What's going on here? Don't do anything silly," said Hermanto, kicking Wawan and running from the room. He ran back to his friends and told them what had happened. Already intoxicated, several of them rushed to Wawan's house, intending to beat him up.

Hearing the commotion, policemen arrived and apprehended the boys. Later, they were placed in a juvenile detention center.

This is one story that tells of the harsh lives faced by street children in Surabaya, a phenomenon found in almost every major city in East Java such as Malang, Sidoarjo and Gresik.

While "street children" may generally mean children without homes and orphans who live off the streets, in Indonesia, the term includes those children with parents or homes who are forced into the streets by poverty to earn some small change.

Recent data gathered by the Child Protection Agency (LPA) of East Java shows an estimated 6,000 street children are scattered throughout East Java, of whom 5,000 -- or 83 percent -- are in Surabaya.

Even worse, an estimated 30 to 70 percent of sex workers in East Java brothels are underaged girls.

Street children are usually found plying major thoroughfares or around public facilities. Most of them sell cigarettes or newspapers, shine shoes, busk, beg or survive as vagrants.

For Hermanto, life on the streets is a choice he was forced to make. He is certainly much less fortunate than other children nationwide who were able to celebrate National Children's Day last Friday in a carefree manner.

"My parents sell fried snacks in Kembang Market. I don't have money to go to school, so it's better to busk," he said.

The 14-year-old boy has been on the streets since he was four, and usually busks on Jl. Tunjungan, where he can make about Rp 50,000 (US$5.50) a day.

"I can make Rp 50,000 just by busking. Isn't that wonderful," he said. The money he can earn on the streets makes him reluctant to leave his "career" as a street kid.

Hermanto realizes, however, that life on the streets is fraught with danger. He has seen many acts of violence committed against other street children.

"Usually, the big boys will ask for their share of money from us or at least a pack of cigarettes. We'll be beaten if we don't give what they ask for," he said.

Hermanto said bad luck after bad luck would strike if he was caught in a raid by municipal authorities assisted by the police. "First, they will take all the money I've made from busking. Then they'll put me in a smelly detention room, like a cage for an animal."

Melly Astuti, an activist at the Surabaya Arek Lintang Foundation, a child protection non-governmental organization that focuses on street children, said the fate of the children was like a double-edged sword.

On the one hand, they were forced to make money for their daily needs, and on the other, they had to face a society and legal system that had clearly disowned them.

"It's a sad situation," said the woman, whom street children call "Mama".

An anthropologist from the University of Washington, S. Chris Brown, who is undertaking research on street children in Surabaya, expressed concern that violence was an unavoidable, daily factor in the world of street children.

"Eventually, they consider violence as natural, and even regard it as a game," he told the Post.

Violence stems from the uncertainties of life on the streets, he said. Unlike normal children, they had no home in which to seek refuge, nor parents from whom to seek comfort.

Living under such conditions harden them so they become immune to the violence they faced every day, he said.