Home sweet hut for 21 people: Cramped quarters for slum dwellers

Home sweet hut for 21 people: Cramped quarters for slum dwellers

By Jupriadi

UJUNGPANDANG, South Sulawesi (JP): The big traditional house
in the Bugis-Makassar style is in poor condition. Several parts
of the corrugated zinc roof leak and the holes are covered with
old clothes. The walls are made of bamboo and thin wood.

"Welcome to our hut," Dengsi, 27, said.

Located on Jl. Teuku Umar in Tallo, a slum in the north of the
city, the structure is occupied by 21 people. Built on stilts,
the house is seven meters wide, 18 meters long, and three meters
high. Older people, including Dengsi's mother-in-law, live in the
house, while the younger ones are on the ground, where the soil
becomes the floor. Two families live on the ground.

"We divide the ground into two. The other part is for my
sister's brother and his family," Dengsi said.

Dengsi lives with Hamo, his 23-year-old wife, and their two
children in a 4x6 square meter area, which is divided in two. The
main part is the bedroom, while the other one is for the living
room, the kitchen and the lavatory. Three red plastic chairs and
a small table are found in the living room, which is separated
from the kitchen by a thin white curtain with a floral motif. It
is stuffy in the kitchen as there is no ventilation. A 25-watt
bulb on the wall is covered by cement wrapping paper but can not
warm the room, especially as water oozes through the walls.

It is the rainy season now and when it rains continuously for
three days, water inundates the ground, to a depth of between 15
and 30 centimeters. Tallo is located on sloping land and because
of the construction of a nearby toll road the area where about 75
houses are located is prone to floods.

Dengsi, a high school graduate, is a temporary worker at a
cocoa factory in the Makassar Industrial Estate and earns between
Rp 5,000 and Rp 7,000 a day.

Before the crisis he said he could make both ends meet, and
had rice, fish and vegetables to eat. But life has become quite
hard in the past year, especially with the rocketing price of
staple food. "A pack of instant noodles was Rp 300, now it is Rp
700," he complained.

Dengsi started to feel the pinch of the crisis when the
company where he worked cut down the size of its workforce and he
was laid off. And then he had to send Ama, his eldest child, to
school. He has found another job, albeit one that is not
permanent, but he cannot make both ends meet. Fortunately, his
mother lends a hand, gives Ama, now in her second year of
elementary school, shelter in her house and pays her school fees
as well.

"When Ama's father was laid off, I worked in a traditional
salt company," Hamo said. But she had to quit because of her
pregnancy. Hamo is now five months pregnant.

Now, she has to tighten the budget greatly, and sometimes
borrows money from her neighbors. Her husband, she said, works
only four days a week and brings home Rp 6,000 on working days.

Pocket money

She has stopped joining the arisan (a neighborhood lottery
which guarantees that every member wins) and never gives her
younger child, the 5-year-old Kiki, any pocket money. She has
also changed the menu for the family.

"Since September, I have not cared about the nutrition any
more. What's important is that we are all full," she said.

She saves a few hundred rupiah every day "for the birth of my
child," she said.

She is glad that Ramadhan has come because during the fasting
month, the family eats only twice a day.

"But I wonder how we will celebrate Lebaran," she said sadly.

This sad story is shared by many other people in Ujungpandang.
There are even children who have to support their families, like
10-year-old Andi.

Andi works as a becak (three-wheel pedicab) driver on Jl.
Pengayoman, an elite neighborhood in the city. He works from
morning until night.

"I can make an average of Rp 9,000 a day," he said. He pays Rp
2,000 for the rent of the becak and spends the rest to buy food.

His house is a small shanty located on a swamp and supported
by old logs. There is no electricity in the house, which is
illuminated by a kerosene lamp. To reach the shanty, one has to
walk over bamboo poles that connect it with the main road in the
Hertasning area. There he lives with his father, mother and two
younger brothers and a sister.

The father is sick and the mother sometimes washes clothes for
the neighbors for small payments and sells kangkung vegetables
that grow in the swamp.

"But I can not make much money. From the kangkung I am able to
make Rp 1,500 at the most," she complains.

There are many other Andis in Ujungpandang as many children
have had to leave school and work since the crisis began. It is
common to see school-aged children pedaling becak or begging in
the streets.